{"id":119709,"date":"2017-03-14T12:55:36","date_gmt":"2017-03-14T07:25:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/globalpress.hinduismnow.org\/?p=50355"},"modified":"2017-03-14T12:55:36","modified_gmt":"2017-03-14T07:25:36","slug":"build-museum-educates-people-british-empires-murderous-rule-india-says-acclaimed-author-independent-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/globalpress-new.hinduismnow.org\/?p=119709","title":{"rendered":"Build a museum that educates people on British Empire’s murderous rule over India, says acclaimed author | Independent"},"content":{"rendered":"

A world-renowned author is calling for museums in London and\u00a0India to demonstrate Britain’s role in reducing the country to one of the “poorest, illiterate and diseased places on earth”.<\/p>\n

Shashi Tharoor wants and \u201cenduring reminder\u201d to educate school children about how the British Empire killed millions, created famine and orchestrated a \u201cdivide and rule\u201d campaign.<\/p>\n

In an article for\u00a0Al Jazeera<\/a>, he said that India was one of the world\u2019s richest countries before British rule, producing 27 per cent of the world’s gross domestic product in 1700.<\/p>\n

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Dr Shashi Tharoor tells the Oxford Union why Britain owes reparations<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Britain reduced it\u00a0\u201cover two centuries of looting and exploitation, one of the poorest, most diseased and most illiterate countries on Earth,\u201d\u00a0added the 61-year-old MP, who chairs the Indian parliament\u2019s foreign affairs committee.<\/p>\n

\u201cAn enduring reminder is needed, both for Indian schoolchildren to educate themselves and for British tourists to visit for their own enlightenment,\u201d he said. \u201cAs I say to young Indians: if you don’t know where you have come from, how will you appreciate where you are going?\u201d<\/p>\n

The London-born author notes that there is no museum devoted to Britain\u2019s imperial conquest in India.<\/p>\n

So the former United Nations secretary asked for the Victoria Memorial in Kolkata to be converted into a museum remembering the British Raj atrocities.<\/p>\n

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Five of the worst atrocities carried out by the British Empire<\/div>\n
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Among the incidents that need documenting are the\u00a0Amritsar massacre<\/a>, which saw colonial soldiers kill between 379 and 1,000 people who were peacefully protesting against British rule.<\/p>\n

Another 1,100 were injured in just 10 minutes, under the orders of Brigadier Reginald Dyer, who was later lauded a hero by the British public, which\u00a0raised \u00a326,000 for him as a thank you.<\/p>\n

Mr Tharoor added that there was also no memorial for “the deaths of 35 million Indians in totally unnecessary famines caused by British policy, or the ‘divide and rule’ policy that culminated in the horrors of Partition in 1947 when the British made their shambolic and tragic Brexit from the subcontinent.”<\/p>\n

He said the “lack of such a museum is striking.\u201d<\/p>\n

Between 12 and 29 million Indians died of starvation during British rule.<\/p>\n

Mr\u00a0Tharoor\u00a0also claimed that\u00a0the Indian railway was a \u201ccolonial scam\u201d\u00a0designed to reap further British benefits.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd at the end of it all, they went home to enjoy their retirements in damp little cottages with Indian names,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

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Graphiq<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

He also wrote how homosexuality is outlawed in India only because Britain suppressed the country\u2019s ancient Hindu texts, which he believes were more liberal.<\/p>\n

India, the world\u2019s largest democracy, still allows Gay Pride marches in major cities<\/a>\u00a0however.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A world-renowned author is calling for museums in London and\u00a0India to demonstrate Britain’s role in reducing the country to one of the “poorest, illiterate and diseased places on earth”. Shashi Tharoor wants and \u201cenduring reminder\u201d to educate school children about how the British Empire killed millions, created famine and orchestrated a \u201cdivide and rule\u201d campaign. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":19,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":""},"categories":[1952],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalpress-new.hinduismnow.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/119709"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalpress-new.hinduismnow.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalpress-new.hinduismnow.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalpress-new.hinduismnow.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/19"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalpress-new.hinduismnow.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=119709"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/globalpress-new.hinduismnow.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/119709\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalpress-new.hinduismnow.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=119709"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalpress-new.hinduismnow.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=119709"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalpress-new.hinduismnow.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=119709"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}