There is a lot more to it than that. If we can stop caucasian-washing history for a second, britain did not simply arrive in india, and leave peacefully either. They lied about their motive as a trade company (the east india company). They used religion (Christianity) To scout the local population and worked with priests/nuns to see if the land as able to be invaded. And when they left they split the country into two, not really considering the implications of dividing a country in half based on their whims. (spoiler alert it caused a massive civil war and had a major historical figure killed). Trusting Britain, and not inventing the machine gun was the biggest mistake India could have done.

Britain literally employed slave labour on the local population, implemented a class based system which destroyed the local population, and murdered anyone who tried to rise up against their tyranny. Sad our history books conveniently ignore the evils of the empire's and the destructive effects of colonization we feel to this day.

During Britain's colonization period of india other channels of foreign trade with India like the French, the Dutch, the Portuguese and the Americans were driven out by vicissitudes of war. Solely the British now controlled the Indian trade with rest of the world.

You can imagine what happens when a foreign invader like Britain can do when they control a soil-rich country such as India.

Britain changed local laws and allowed the new Capital holders’ to own land in India. The British bought lands for plantations, which were manned by Indian slave labour. Thus even the agricultural export profits benefited only the British plantation owners, and not the starving labourers.

Britain resold Indian produced goods onto the global market for massive profits.

Indians were put into debt by the British during their rule and while they had the engineers to build their own cheaper alternative railways, they were forced to import British railroads and had to pay for it, as their exports were funneled from their home country to various parts of britain to be exported.

There is a lot more i could go into on this topic, but this isn't some sort of "woke police", this is pretty established history. Britain did invade India, this was a thing that happened, it was pretty horrible, sad we don't teach our children about the horrors of colonization.

http://www.srimatham.com/uploads/5/5/4/9/5549439/how_the_bri...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x_jGPf764d0&ab_channel=VICE

https://qz.com/india/290497/the-forgotten-story-of-indias-co...

https://www.jstor.org/stable/2756302

"They used religion (Christianity) To scout the local population and worked with priests/nuns to see if the land as able to be invaded."

Did the British even make it to India before the Reformation? There aren't a whole lot of Anglican nuns.

And yet if you asked Indians today whether they'd remove this from history alongside English and Cricket being removed, they'd still choose to be speaking English and playing Cricket, in part due to the huge economic advantage given to the subcontinent by the British "invading"

My other comment is applicable here too: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33980426

I literally copy and pasted what I could find from the brief article. Your beef is with the authors.

No, context matters.

You trivialized the subject by your one-liner and rightfully got schooled on it.

At least 5 HN readers disagree with you.

That means nothing i.e. Ignorance.

It is a question of Education and Why one should not trivialize it.

You are right, I don't want to remain ignorant. Educate us about the sudras and untouchables.

Brahmans, Kshatriyas, Vaisyas, and Sudras are the four Hindu castes. These castes or groupings are called varnas. Whatever caste or varna a baby is born into will be his or her varna for life. Marriages for young people are arranged within one's caste. Each caste has its codes of conduct and unique lifestyles. For example, upper caste members receive better education. For centuries lower caste members were forbidden to even acquire books. Sudras' work never allows them to gain financial independence or accumulate wealth. All wealth in Indian society is reserved for the top three castes.

Below the four varnas is a fifth group called Achuta, known as Untouchables.

???

Totally irrelevant to the topic at hand; you have now officially "jumped the shark".

The suffering of the Indian people is not the topic at hand, it's the suffering of the Indian people caused by British and only the British. Got it.

Yes it was very bad. I saw a documentary about it called RRR.

Sarcasm without Knowledge is merely Ignorance masquerading as Intelligence.

You spelt “Education” with a capital E there…

I think RammedAss has reached his intellectual limit.

Personal attacks will get you banned here, regardless of how wrong someone is or you feel they are. Please don't do that again!

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html