British empire killed 165 million Indians in 40 years: How colonialism inspired fascism

British empire killed 165 million Indians in 40 years:​

How colonialism inspired fascism​

A scholarly study found that British colonialism caused approximately 165 million deaths in India from 1880 to 1920, while stealing trillions of dollars of wealth. The global capitalist system was founded on European imperial genocides, which inspired Adolf Hitler and led to fascism.

By
Ben Norton
Published
2022-12-12

British colonialism caused at least 100 million deaths in India in roughly 40 years, according to an academic study.
And during nearly 200 years of colonialism, the British empire stole at least $45 trillion in wealth from India, a prominent economist has calculated.
The genocidal crimes committed by European empires outside of their borders inspired Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini, leading to the rise of fascist regimes that carried out similar genocidal crimes within their borders.

Economic anthropologist Jason Hickel and his co-author Dylan Sullivan published an article in the respected academic journal World Development titled “Capitalism and extreme poverty: A global analysis of real wages, human height, and mortality since the long 16th century.”
In the report, the scholars estimated that India suffered 165 million excess deaths due to British colonialism between 1880 and 1920.
“This figure is larger than the combined number of deaths from both World Wars, including the Nazi holocaust,” they noted.
They added, “Indian life expectancy did not reach the level of early modern England (35.8 years) until 1950, after decolonization.”

Hickel and Sullivan summarized their research in an article in Al Jazeera, titled “How British colonialism killed 100 million Indians in 40 years.”
They explained:

According to research by the economic historian Robert C Allen, extreme poverty in India increased under British rule, from 23 percent in 1810 to more than 50 percent in the mid-20th century. Real wages declined during the British colonial period, reaching a nadir in the 19th century, while famines became more frequent and more deadly. Far from benefitting the Indian people, colonialism was a human tragedy with few parallels in recorded history.
Experts agree that the period from 1880 to 1920 – the height of Britain’s imperial power – was particularly devastating for India. Comprehensive population censuses carried out by the colonial regime beginning in the 1880s reveal that the death rate increased considerably during this period, from 37.2 deaths per 1,000 people in the 1880s to 44.2 in the 1910s. Life expectancy declined from 26.7 years to 21.9 years.
In a recent paper in the journal World Development, we used census data to estimate the number of people killed by British imperial policies during these four brutal decades. Robust data on mortality rates in India only exists from the 1880s. If we use this as the baseline for “normal” mortality, we find that some 50 million excess deaths occurred under the aegis of British colonialism during the period from 1891 to 1920.
Fifty million deaths is a staggering figure, and yet this is a conservative estimate. Data on real wages indicates that by 1880, living standards in colonial India had already declined dramatically from their previous levels. Allen and other scholars argue that prior to colonialism, Indian living standards may have been “on a par with the developing parts of Western Europe.” We do not know for sure what India’s pre-colonial mortality rate was, but if we assume it was similar to that of England in the 16th and 17th centuries (27.18 deaths per 1,000 people), we find that 165 million excess deaths occurred in India during the period from 1881 to 1920.
While the precise number of deaths is sensitive to the assumptions we make about baseline mortality, it is clear that somewhere in the vicinity of 100 million people died prematurely at the height of British colonialism. This is among the largest policy-induced mortality crises in human history. It is larger than the combined number of deaths that occurred during all famines in the Soviet Union, Maoist China, North Korea, Pol Pot’s Cambodia, and Mengistu’s Ethiopia.

This staggering figure does not include the tens of millions more Indians who died in human-made famines that were caused by the British empire.
In the notorious Bengal famine in 1943, an estimated 3 million Indians starved to death, while the British government exported food and banned grain imports.
Academic studies by scientists found that the 1943 Bengal famine was not a result of natural causes; it was the product of the policies of British Prime Minister Winston Churchill.


Churchill himself was a notorious racist who stated, “I hate Indians. They are a beastly people with a beastly religion.”
In the early 1930s, Churchill also admired Nazi leader Adolf Hitler and the Italian dictator who founded fascism, Benito Mussolini.
Churchill’s own scholarly supporters admitted that he “expressed admiration for Mussolini” and, “if forced to choose between Italian fascism and Italian communism, Churchill unhesitatingly would choose the former.”


Indian politician Shashi Tharoor, who served as an under-secretary general of the United Nations, has exhaustively documented the crimes of the British empire, particularly under Churchill.
“Churchill has as much blood on his hands as Hitler does,” Tharoor stressed. He pointed to “the decisions that he [Churchill] personally signed off during the Bengal famine, when 4.3 million people died because of the decisions he took or endorsed.”
Award-winning Indian economist Utsa Patnaik has estimated that the British empire drained $45 trillion of wealth from the Indian subcontinent.


In a 2018 interview with the Indian news website Mint, she explained:

Between 1765 and 1938, the drain amounted to £9.2 trillion (equal to $45 trillion), taking India’s export surplus earnings as the measure, and compounding it at a 5% rate of interest. Indians were never credited with their own gold and forex earnings. Instead, the local producers here were ‘paid’ the rupee equivalent out of the budget—something you’d never find in any independent country. The ‘drain’ varied between 26-36% of the central government budget. It would obviously have made an enormous difference if India’s huge international earnings had been retained within the country. India would have been far more developed, with much better health and social welfare indicators. There was virtually no increase in per capita income between 1900 and 1946, even though India registered the second largest export surplus earnings in the world for three decades before 1929.
Since all the earnings were taken by Britain, such stagnation is not surprising. Ordinary people died like flies owing to under-nutrition and disease. It is shocking that Indian expectation of life at birth was just 22 years in 1911. The most telling index, however, is food grain availability. Because the purchasing power of ordinary Indians was being squeezed by high taxes, the per capita annual consumption of food grains went down from 200kg in 1900 to 157kg on the eve of World War II, and further plummeted to 137kg by 1946. No country in the world today, not even the least developed, is anywhere near the position India was in 1946.

Patnaik emphasized:

The modern capitalist world would not exist without colonialism and the drain. During Britain’s industrial transition, 1780 to 1820, the drain from Asia and the West Indies combined was about 6 percent of Britain’s GDP, nearly the same as its own savings rate. After the mid-19th century, Britain was running current account deficits with Continental Europe and North America, and at the same time, it was investing massively in these regions, which meant running capital account deficits too. The two deficits summed to large and rising balance of payments (BoP) deficits with these regions.
How was it possible for Britain to export so much capital—which went into building railways, roads and factories in the U.S. and continental Europe? Its BoP deficits with these regions were being settled by appropriating the financial gold and forex earned by the colonies, especially India. Every unusual expense like war was also put on the Indian budget, and whatever India was not able to meet through its annual exchange earnings was shown as its indebtedness, on which interest accumulated.

In this article:Britain, capitalism, colonialism, famine, fascism, genocide, India, Shashi Tharoor, UK, United Kingdom, Utsa Patnaik, Winston Churchill

 

[sms]

Now they complain about immigration in UK. Their whole economic might is built on our stolen wealth.
Let's breed every white woman with a subcontinent sperm until the white man be seen only in a museum. As a rare and endangered species.

ghazwa e Europe?

Western American apologists aren't liberals or progressive at all. Ironically those people align themselves with right wing neo Nazi groups in the west more than progressive liberals.

Nazism/ fascism stemmed form leftist ideology!

 

[SecularNationalist]

ghazwa e Europe?

Ghazwa e bartaniya

 

[Joe Shearer]

Joe and Indu killed more than British

What a mean thing to say.

Nazism/ fascism stemmed form leftist ideology!

Painful to read this kind of flippant response.

 

[Tom-tom]

Muslim added GDP, art, culture and class to India. Britishers added misery and slave mentality to India.

It’s sickening to see some Hindus and few “Pakistanis” here claim the Brits added more value and that the Muslims were more barbaric in their rule. I see these moronic posts from Indian Hindus that sanitize British rule to make the Muslims look worse.

@Sayfullah you know exactly who comes to mind right!

Listen guys, If you look up Rhodes, his statement - a whole country was named after him. Called rhodesia.

Can't say his biblical statement word for word. It's basically the Anglo race is the best race along with saxo's and they are to lead other Europeans. The other lower other races are to be put to work and worked for the benefit of them, until they are no more leaving the world to the Europeans.

The Muslims that entered South Asia did not have this out look, as firstly the book can't changed, they principled to terms even when it put them at loss. Also they looked at South. Asia as something and the people of South asian as extension of themselves with the desire to make it their home.


There were influential ppl in the top upper crust like Rhodes, way before himself. Also Rhodes even edited the bible not sure if this bible still exist.

Both get stickers for coming to this epiphany, where should I send it.

 

[Tom-tom]

@Genghis khan1

&


@AA_

Listen guys don't be rude, I asked for your residential addresses so I can send star achievement plaques that can be permanently fitted to your fridge. I will have use an impact and a few industrial tools to fix it permanently.

It may effect the efficiency rating and performance of your fridge though.

How ever you can look at every morning and can think how proud your mum is of you. Also does your mum cut the crusts off your bread or do you do that now?

 

[Muji.Iqbal]

No doubt the British committed many crimes against humanity in the British Raj.

Good now they are some unimportant island in world affairs.

 

[indushek]

In effect you are saying that there will be something, but cannot say what that is.

It is this kind of shallow attempt at reconciliation - shallow because based entirely on paying lip-service to a duty, and active and dogged resistance in daily life to that duty being executed - that makes it clear that voluntary reconciliation will not happen.


It has happened to me personally.


Incidentally I live as a tenant of a Sastri today. The example given was a real-life one, and happens all the time, and every time I looked for a house, in a number of instances, it has happened.

That, though I am a high-caste Hindu.

Would you like to hear the real life stories of a Muslim wife of a gentleman named Jonnalagada? The contrast between Z***** looking for a flat and Mrs. J looking for a flat?


That is imprecise.

It involves prejudiced Brahmins, prejudiced Banias (read the history of the Gita Press), and prejudiced Thakurs, Gujjars, Jats and Yadavs. It also involves a wide range of OBCs who act as grunts with no concrete grievance against Muslims, and only the titillation of mob action.

As for condemning Brahmins without differentiation, you failed to notice that my examples are taken from the reports and research of, among others, Brahmins. It is the bigots among them that are to be feared.

Am really sad to hear this, that its happening in this day and age. I mean not even in towns like Vijayawada (I come from) and my wife's town which is further away on Guntur side, have I seen this kind of issue.
Yes there are subtle signs here and there, but no one acts in such brazen way. While I have no religiosity bone in me, my brother in law is a practising priest who does puja stuff. I mean my wife's side is kind of poor, and he couldn't get much formal education. So that's the career he chose, and even he has no such ideas. Every friend of his just like mine, are not Brahmins.

They come home freely mingle and eat together, am not saying all this to prove anything. Its difficult to fathom such brazenness, unless its in some movie or web series kind of thing.

My past week has been a shit at work, didn't get much time to get on. Will get back on others, but this post makes me wonder really.

 

[Menace2Society]

Listen guys, If you look up Rhodes, his statement - a whole country was named after him. Called rhodesia.

Can't say his biblical statement word for word. It's basically the Anglo race is the best race along with saxo's and they are to lead other Europeans. The other lower other races are to be put to work and worked for the benefit of them, until they are no more leaving the world to the Europeans.

The Muslims that entered South Asia did not have this out look, as firstly the book can't changed, they principled to terms even when it put them at loss. Also they looked at South. Asia as something and the people of South asian as extension of themselves with the desire to make it their home.


There were influential ppl in the top upper crust like Rhodes, way before himself. Also Rhodes even edited the bible not sure if this bible still exist.

Both get stickers for coming to this epiphany, where should I send it.

It is an absolute no brainer the British were better for the subcontinent than the Arabs. Jinnah was a British educated lawyer and through the collapse and empire retreating Pakistan was able to form with the structures of a functioning state, army, governance, military. If it wasn't for the British and the Americans, Pakistan would not have been able to fend off the Indian assault in 65 and survive. How long were Afghans and Arabs in control of Indus? They only used it as a launchpad to venture deeper into the subcontinent, nothing more and if anyone claims to see it as more than that is delusional.

The culture we speak about comes from Indus, we have always had culture and the invaders piggyback off us and claim it as theirs. Also Indus was far more spiritually advanced than Arabia or Afghans.

 

[Joe Shearer]

Am really sad to hear this, that its happening in this day and age. I mean not even in towns like Vijayawada (I come from) and my wife's town which is further away on Guntur side, have I seen this kind of issue.
Yes there are subtle signs here and there, but no one acts in such brazen way. While I have no religiosity bone in me, my brother in law is a practising priest who does puja stuff. I mean my wife's side is kind of poor, and he couldn't get much formal education. So that's the career he chose, and even he has no such ideas. Every friend of his just like mine, are not Brahmins.

They come home freely mingle and eat together, am not saying all this to prove anything. Its difficult to fathom such brazenness, unless its in some movie or web series kind of thing.

My past week has been a shit at work, didn't get much time to get on. Will get back on others, but this post makes me wonder really.

Welcome to planet earth.

 

[Muji.Iqbal]

British empire killed 165 million Indians in 40 years:​

How colonialism inspired fascism​

A scholarly study found that British colonialism caused approximately 165 million deaths in India from 1880 to 1920, while stealing trillions of dollars of wealth. The global capitalist system was founded on European imperial genocides, which inspired Adolf Hitler and led to fascism.

By
Ben Norton
Published
2022-12-12

British colonialism caused at least 100 million deaths in India in roughly 40 years, according to an academic study.
And during nearly 200 years of colonialism, the British empire stole at least $45 trillion in wealth from India, a prominent economist has calculated.
The genocidal crimes committed by European empires outside of their borders inspired Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini, leading to the rise of fascist regimes that carried out similar genocidal crimes within their borders.

Economic anthropologist Jason Hickel and his co-author Dylan Sullivan published an article in the respected academic journal World Development titled “Capitalism and extreme poverty: A global analysis of real wages, human height, and mortality since the long 16th century.”
In the report, the scholars estimated that India suffered 165 million excess deaths due to British colonialism between 1880 and 1920.
“This figure is larger than the combined number of deaths from both World Wars, including the Nazi holocaust,” they noted.
They added, “Indian life expectancy did not reach the level of early modern England (35.8 years) until 1950, after decolonization.”

Hickel and Sullivan summarized their research in an article in Al Jazeera, titled “How British colonialism killed 100 million Indians in 40 years.”
They explained:



This staggering figure does not include the tens of millions more Indians who died in human-made famines that were caused by the British empire.
In the notorious Bengal famine in 1943, an estimated 3 million Indians starved to death, while the British government exported food and banned grain imports.
Academic studies by scientists found that the 1943 Bengal famine was not a result of natural causes; it was the product of the policies of British Prime Minister Winston Churchill.


Churchill himself was a notorious racist who stated, “I hate Indians. They are a beastly people with a beastly religion.”
In the early 1930s, Churchill also admired Nazi leader Adolf Hitler and the Italian dictator who founded fascism, Benito Mussolini.
Churchill’s own scholarly supporters admitted that he “expressed admiration for Mussolini” and, “if forced to choose between Italian fascism and Italian communism, Churchill unhesitatingly would choose the former.”


Indian politician Shashi Tharoor, who served as an under-secretary general of the United Nations, has exhaustively documented the crimes of the British empire, particularly under Churchill.
“Churchill has as much blood on his hands as Hitler does,” Tharoor stressed. He pointed to “the decisions that he [Churchill] personally signed off during the Bengal famine, when 4.3 million people died because of the decisions he took or endorsed.”
Award-winning Indian economist Utsa Patnaik has estimated that the British empire drained $45 trillion of wealth from the Indian subcontinent.


In a 2018 interview with the Indian news website Mint, she explained:

Patnaik emphasized:

In this article:Britain, capitalism, colonialism, famine, fascism, genocide, India, Shashi Tharoor, UK, United Kingdom, Utsa Patnaik, Winston Churchill

The British committed many injustices against the people of "South Asia." I agree with that.

But look mate, the British is now gone and that racist generation is gone as well.
It has almost been 100 years since partition. Its time to move on now.

 

[Abid123]

**** the UK.

 

[maverick1977]

British empire killed 165 million Indians in 40 years:​

How colonialism inspired fascism​

A scholarly study found that British colonialism caused approximately 165 million deaths in India from 1880 to 1920, while stealing trillions of dollars of wealth. The global capitalist system was founded on European imperial genocides, which inspired Adolf Hitler and led to fascism.

By
Ben Norton
Published
2022-12-12

British colonialism caused at least 100 million deaths in India in roughly 40 years, according to an academic study.
And during nearly 200 years of colonialism, the British empire stole at least $45 trillion in wealth from India, a prominent economist has calculated.
The genocidal crimes committed by European empires outside of their borders inspired Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini, leading to the rise of fascist regimes that carried out similar genocidal crimes within their borders.

Economic anthropologist Jason Hickel and his co-author Dylan Sullivan published an article in the respected academic journal World Development titled “Capitalism and extreme poverty: A global analysis of real wages, human height, and mortality since the long 16th century.”
In the report, the scholars estimated that India suffered 165 million excess deaths due to British colonialism between 1880 and 1920.
“This figure is larger than the combined number of deaths from both World Wars, including the Nazi holocaust,” they noted.
They added, “Indian life expectancy did not reach the level of early modern England (35.8 years) until 1950, after decolonization.”

Hickel and Sullivan summarized their research in an article in Al Jazeera, titled “How British colonialism killed 100 million Indians in 40 years.”
They explained:



This staggering figure does not include the tens of millions more Indians who died in human-made famines that were caused by the British empire.
In the notorious Bengal famine in 1943, an estimated 3 million Indians starved to death, while the British government exported food and banned grain imports.
Academic studies by scientists found that the 1943 Bengal famine was not a result of natural causes; it was the product of the policies of British Prime Minister Winston Churchill.


Churchill himself was a notorious racist who stated, “I hate Indians. They are a beastly people with a beastly religion.”
In the early 1930s, Churchill also admired Nazi leader Adolf Hitler and the Italian dictator who founded fascism, Benito Mussolini.
Churchill’s own scholarly supporters admitted that he “expressed admiration for Mussolini” and, “if forced to choose between Italian fascism and Italian communism, Churchill unhesitatingly would choose the former.”


Indian politician Shashi Tharoor, who served as an under-secretary general of the United Nations, has exhaustively documented the crimes of the British empire, particularly under Churchill.
“Churchill has as much blood on his hands as Hitler does,” Tharoor stressed. He pointed to “the decisions that he [Churchill] personally signed off during the Bengal famine, when 4.3 million people died because of the decisions he took or endorsed.”
Award-winning Indian economist Utsa Patnaik has estimated that the British empire drained $45 trillion of wealth from the Indian subcontinent.


In a 2018 interview with the Indian news website Mint, she explained:

Patnaik emphasized:

In this article:Britain, capitalism, colonialism, famine, fascism, genocide, India, Shashi Tharoor, UK, United Kingdom, Utsa Patnaik, Winston Churchill

wth... hate the British empire, genocidal..

 

[Hamartia Antidote]

Here is the complete paper, if anyone is interested in that sort of thing:

Capitalism and extreme poverty: A global analysis of real wages, human height, and mortality since the long 16th century

This paper assesses claims that, prior to the 19th century, around 90% of the human population lived in extreme poverty (defined as the inability to a…

www.sciencedirect.com

Capitalism and extreme poverty: A global analysis of real wages, human height, and mortality since the long 16th century​

The premise of this paper seems illogical as Brunei is one of the wealthiest countries on the planet yet they are not known for being particularly tall.

 

[ghazi52]

.,.,.
Punkha-wallahs,

https://twitter.com/x/status/1672466460659298305

On this sweltering Indian summer day, let's travel back in time to the era of colonial India. This is a fascinating story about the Punkha-wallahs, those unfortunate and anonymous individuals who provided comfort to the affluent during the scorching heat.





Imagine being an affluent British elite in colonial India. In your grand, luxurious bungalow, you would have personal servants known as Punkha-wallahs. They are mostly the servants of the lowest strata. Their job?


To pull a giant hanging fan from the ceiling with a rope, creating a gentle breeze while you dine, write, relax, or even sleep. It is also said that the visual and hearing impaired servants were prioritized for this job to prevent eavesdropping.

The Punkha-wallahs were paid a few annas per day based on the enthusiasm and dedication to their task. To ensure privacy, many bedrooms had a hole in the wall through which the rope could pass, allowing the Punkha-wallah to swing the fan from outside.

Now, picture this: You retire for the night, hoping for a peaceful night's sleep. A few worn-out shoes and boots are conveniently placed within your reach.

Well, in case you woke up in the middle of the night, drenched in sweat, and discovered that the Punkha had stopped swaying. It was an indicator that the exhausted Punkha-wallah might have dozed off. So, what did you do?

You promptly hurled a boot towards the sleeping servant, to wake them up and resume their duty of swinging the Punkha. A rather peculiar and inhuman wake-up call indeed! But, that was just an integral part of colonization.

What's more, if the shoes missed the target, they would resort to physical force: punching or kicking,sometimes even leading to death. In the 19th century there were several cases where punkha wallahs sued their employers for violence.

 

[niaz]

According to (https://www.statista.com/statistics/1066922/population-india-historical/) population of India excluding Pakistan and Bangla Desh was around 225- million in 1880 and about 270-million in 1920. Per 1951 census, Pakistan's population (including East Pakistan) was 75-million which was about 20% of India at that time. This makes population of the subcontinent approx 270-million in 1880 & 325--million in 1920.

The figure of 165-million is therefore highly exaggerated. I would say that total numbers killed was at best 50-million even if that.