British Imperialism on India

402 Words2 Pages
Although Britain benefitted from the resources in India and the Indian people benefitted from modernization, India lost control of their government and became dependant on the British. British imperialism in India had reciprocal effects towards each other. For example, in order to help India, Britain had to pay for improvements. Clearly, both the English and Indians were greatly affected by imperialism whether it was positive or negative. For starters, the English helped and hurt themselves when they imperialized India. England took many of India’s resources and used them to improve their own economy. They “live[d] off of India while they [were there]” (Doc. 2), making extra profit out of agriculture and manufactured goods that they didn’t have to grow or build themselves. However, England had to invest a lot of money in the improvement and modernization of India. The British “develop[ed] the territory by building roads, canals, railways”(Document 1) and “establish[ed] schools and newspapers”(Document 1) which isn’t cheap—especially if they have two countries to take care of. In addition, India was even more affected by imperialism. Changes in the Indian society due to English imperialism were necessary and significant, but not worth getting governmental power and independence stripped away from them. The British gave the Indians “the benefit of…blessings of civilization which they did not have the means of creating themselves”. (Document 1) Western education, courts of justice, and laws were introduced. (Document 3) Social issues were improved as well, such as the end of infanticide (Document 5) and improvements in sanitation (Document 5). Nevertheless, when given too much, India grew dependant on England. The British did “everything for [them],” (Document 7) giving “[them] no responsibility for [their] own government”. (Document 7) The English grew power-hungry,
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