>>5960997
>Brits arrive in India
>Find a fractured patchwork of feudal states, tribal kingdoms, and Mughal leftovers
>Introduce railroads, postal system, telegraph lines, legal codes, standardized currency
>Build the worldβs fourth-largest rail network by 1900
>Introduce English, the language that now runs Indiaβs tech, business, and science sectors
>End practices like sati (widow burning) and reduce caste-based legal discrimination
>Establish Western-style universities, medical schools, civil service training
>Laid down the physical and institutional skeleton of the modern Indian state
>Introduced smallpox vaccinations, Western medicine, sewage systems
>Bring industrial mining, textile mills, water sanitation
>British pull out in 1947
>Pakistan and India immediately start butchering each other in partition riots
>British-built cities get renamed, tech decays, corruption skyrockets
>Railways fall into disrepair, water systems rot, electricity fails
>Indian government nationalizes everything and tanks productivity
>Pakistan devolves into a military-ISLAMIC state hybrid
>75 years later
>Still rely on British legal system
>Still rely on English for global relevance
>Still use colonial railways
>Still havenβt matched what the Raj built with 1800s tech
Every empire exploitsβbut name another that left behind functional state institutions. Despite being a minority administrative class ruling over 300 million, fewer than 1,000 British civil servants ran the entire Raj at its peak. No mass genocide, no scorched earth policies, no Mongol-style extermination. Just bureaucracy, railways, and tax collection. Not daily interference or cultural extermination. But hey, at least you renamed Victoria Station to βChhatrapati Shivaji Terminusβ. Progress.jpg
