The legacy of colonialism

The chapter's verdict is direct. European rule was not a 'civilising mission': India's own civilisation was much older than Europe's. It was a process of subjugation and exploitation carried out systematically, with brutal repression when needed.

Apart from a small Indian elite who accepted British rule as unavoidable, Indians suffered what many colonised peoples suffered: abuse, exploitation, violence and uprooting.

But then the chapter does something careful. It records consequences that were real, and mostly unintended (nobody planned them).

Colonial rule opened (or re-opened) India to the world, and the world to India. The British recorded their conquest systematically: detailed geographical surveys; lists of ethnic groups (flawed, because based on the unscientific idea of 'race', which genetics has shown does not exist); and studies of India's monuments, which restored some ruins and began the discipline of archaeology.

In the same process they took thousands of statues, paintings, jewels, manuscripts and other objects, sending them to European museums or private collections. A deep cultural loss, which also, awkwardly, made Indian art admired by the European public. Debates about returning these treasures continue today.

The last consequence is the most surprising. British scholars published the first translations of Sanskrit texts into a European language: Charles Wilkins' English Bhagavad Gītā in 1785. The French, Germans and others followed.

Their motives were mixed: some truly admired India's ancient culture; others thought studying Indian texts would help prove Christianity superior.

Either way, the German philosopher Georg Hegel compared the arrival of Sanskrit texts in Europe to the 'discovery of a new continent'. Indian texts influenced European philosophers, writers, poets, artists and statesmen, and reached the United States in the 19th century: "a reminder that although political domination may flow in one direction, cultural influence sometimes flows in the opposite direction."