Once it became a colony of British colonists, India fell into the abyss of suffering. The biggest disaster brought to India by the British colonial company flag from 177 to 181 was the destruction of India's traditional handicrafts. Before the middle of the 18th century, handmade cotton textile industry was the most "comparative advantage" industry in India. However, before the industrial revolution at the end of the 18th century, the Indian handicraft industry, which had been brilliant in the world for thousands of years, never recovered. British colonial rule dealt a heavy blow to India's handicraft industry, making millions of craftsmen lose their livelihood and a large number of people died of hunger. The population of Dhaka dropped from 15, in the mid-18th century to 3, to 4, in 184. "This kind of disaster is almost unique in business history. The bones of the weavers bleached the plains of India. " An East India Governor once said this. British colonial rule also caused famine in India. In order to make money, the British East India Company imposed exorbitant taxes and levies, and soon after it ruled the eastern part of India, it nearly doubled the land tax, causing famine for years. In 177 alone, 1 million people starved to death, accounting for about one-third of Bangladesh's population! "Between 1769 and 177, the British created a famine by hoarding all the rice and refusing to sell it at an appalling price." Before the arrival of Western European colonists, India was one of the most prosperous regions in the world, and after becoming a British colony, India became a "backward country" despised by westerners. Since the 196s, the East India Company began to decline. In 1813, the East India Company's trade monopoly on India was cancelled, and in the same year, the British government cancelled its trade monopoly on China. After the East India Company's trade privilege with China was abolished, the British businessmen who came to Guangzhou for the 13th trade changed from the original unified organization of the East India Company to scattered businesses, and the British government appointed officials to negotiate business matters with the China government, which changed the original negotiations between businessmen into intergovernmental negotiations, thus sowing the seeds of the conflict between China and Britain. After all kinds of powers were abolished, the East India Company went bankrupt. In 1858, after the East India Company spent all its life to amass enough wealth for Britain, it was kicked off, officially cancelled by the British government, and the British government began to rule India directly until 1947.
The collapse of the company
The bankruptcy of the East India Company is not accidental, and there are three reasons: 1. Corruption and smuggling among company employees have become a common practice, which has caused the company's total income to drop sharply. 2. Due to the company's extortions from the Indian people, the Indian people are constantly uprising. And the company needs a lot of money to suppress the uprising. This creates a vicious circle, which keeps the company in crisis. 3. The East India Company is the representative of commercial monopoly capital, and industrial capital has developed rapidly in Britain, and commercial capital has gradually lost its former position. This is also the main reason for the collapse of the company. The administration of India by the East India Company became the prototype of the British civil service system. After the monopoly of the company was broken in 1813, the company gradually separated from the trading business. After the Indian national uprising in 1857, the company also handed over its management affairs to the British government, and India became a British crown colony. In the mid-196s, all the company's property in India was delivered to the government. The company only helps the government to engage in tea trade (especially with St. Helena). The East India Company was dissolved on January 1, 1874 after the dividend redemption act came into effect. The Times commented: In the history of mankind, it has accomplished tasks that no company has ever undertaken, and may not undertake in the future. In 1987, a coffee merchant set up a limited company named "East India Company" and applied for the emblem of the former East India Company as his trademark in 199. However, the Patent Office pointed out that "companies that use this emblem cannot call themselves' East India Company', but in 1996, the company set up its own website. The company still sells coffee on St. Helena under the name of "East India Company" and has published a book introducing the history of the East India Company. However, it should be noted that although the company claims to be founded in 16, it has nothing to do with the original company in law.
historical imprint
1. Expanding the territory of the British Empire. 2. Colonial plunder and accumulation of commercial capital. 3. The strategic location refers to Afghanistan in the north, Southeast Asia in the south and China in the east. Become a strong strategic support point. 4. Deepening colonization, becoming the sales market of British industrial products, supporting the development of domestic capitalism, thus promoting the wave of colonization. 5, crowding out other colonial powers in Europe. 6. The rule of the East India Company accumulated experience for the direct rule and management of the imperial government in the future.
Evaluation of British East India Company
The East India Company is not the same as today's multinational companies. They all obtained the exclusive trade right of the East India Company's building in Britain from their own governments, and they also owned the army (including the fleet), established government agencies in the colonies, carried out brutal political rule and economic plunder on the colonies, and even sold slaves and drugs. They came into being and existed from the end of 16th century to the first half of 19th century, and played an important role in the primitive accumulation of capitalism in various countries. At the end of 16th century and the beginning of 17th century, Portugal, Britain, Netherlands, Denmark, France and other countries successively set up the East India Company in India, Indonesia and Malaya in the Eastern Hemisphere. As for why they were all named "East India Company", this is related to Columbus' mistake of regarding America as India and spreading it around. In 1492, Columbus sailed to the West Indies in today's Central America, mistaking it for India and treating the natives as Indians (today, Native Americans are still called Indians, which is the same word as Indians in English). Later, people found out that they were wrong (Columbus himself refused to admit that he was wrong until his death), but they still made mistakes, calling the real India (even some Southeast Asian countries such as Indonesia) "East India" and the islands in the American Caribbean "West India", hence the names of these colonial companies. Why did the Netherlands, Britain and France set up the East India Company in the Eastern Hemisphere? This is because in the 17th-18th century, these three countries were the main colonial countries in the world (and Spain, but it mainly expanded in the Western Hemisphere), and their competition in the Eastern Hemisphere was particularly fierce. The scramble to set up the East India Company was an important manifestation and means of their competition. Finally, Britain won, and the British East India Company was also the most famous. With the development and gradual completion of the industrial revolution, free competition and free trade have become the strong demands of the emerging industrial bourgeoisie. This privileged company has not adapted to the requirements of the further development of capitalism, and it was dissolved by governments of various countries in the mid-18th century.