On Balance - Was Britain a Net Gain for India‪?‬

A storm that has been brewing in a tea cup has recently been gathering pace.

Was Britain a net gain for India or nothing more than a net drain? The question has led to calls for Britain to pay reparations to her colonies, and no colony supplied more than her Indian Empire. But to what extent was Britain a burden and to what extent, if one dare ask, was she a blessing for the Indian people?

Viceroy Lord Curzon was adamant that the British had arrived 'under Providence' to the benefit of millions but others under the British Raj saw their arrival as a curse.

On Balance is the last in the three-part 'British Raj Series' that seeks to illuminate and evaluate British rule in India. Here, this brief analysis centres around the controversial debate of Britain's legacy, both past and present, by leaving no stone unturned, no matter how contentious, in the search for whether Britain, on balance, was a net gain or net disaster.