It’d be a lie if we said that we’re completely over the colonial hangover left over by the two centuries of British rule. Today, living in an independent India, it’s hard to imagine a foreign nation ruling over us. A lot of blood was shed for the sweet taste of freedom and there’s nothing that we cherish more than being independent. Having said so, just for the sake of the mind’s exercise, let’s try to imagine the things that may have happened if the British never really ruled India. What about Democracy? There’s hardly any suggestion of democracy in pre-British India. The British introduced the Parliamentary elections in India with the Indian Council Act of 1861. It was the first time that Indians could vote for the Lok Sabha which translates to “Council of the people”. Although the British would retain responsibilities for the defense and foreign affairs of India, they did introduce electoral systems to the country which otherwise may have remained a monarchy for years to follow.

The country may have been richer

According to Dadabhai Naoroji’s book, “Poverty And Un-British Rule In India”, the amount of wealth drained by the British from Indian resources amounted to 4 million pounds every year. Therefore, India may not have been a “third world” nation in the first place, had the British never ruled the country.

It can be assumed that we would not have to deal with the devastating destitution had we n0t have to start off from a point where the British had left us almost economically barren.

World War II wouldn’t have affected India

India had always been a peaceful nation and would have nothing to with the World War II had it not been under the rule of the British. More than two million sons of our soil were sent to fight the Axis powers in a war we had nothing to do with.

The unscrupulous wartime policies of the British to supply food to soldiers at war led to the shortage of food in Bengal and Bihar causing millions of deaths out of starvation. The devastation of the Second World War was not something India ever needed.