Editing Colonial India (section)

===East India Company===
{{See also|Company rule in India}}
In 1757, [[Mir Jafar]], the commander-in-chief of the army of the [[Nawab of Bengal]], along with [[Jagat Seth]] and some others secretly working with the British, asked for their support to overthrow the Nawab in return for trade grants. The British forces, whose sole duty until then was guarding Company property,{{citation needed|date=June 2022}} were numerically inferior to the [[Bengal Subah|Bengali]] armed forces. At the [[Battle of Plassey]] on 23 June 1757, fought between the British under the command of [[Robert Clive]] and the Nawab, Mir Jafar's forces betrayed the Nawab and helped them to defeat him. Jafar was installed on the throne as a British subservient ruler.<ref>{{cite book |last=Wolpert |first=Stanley |author-link=Stanley Wolpert |year=2004 |orig-year=First published 1977 |title=A New History of India |edition=7th |publisher=Oxford University Press |page=181 |isbn=978-0-19-516677-4}}</ref> The battle transformed British perspective as they realised their strength and potential to conquer smaller Indian kingdoms and marked the beginning of the imperial or colonial era in South Asia.

[[File:Lord Clive meeting with Mir Jafar after the Battle of Plassey.jpg|thumb|left|180px|''Lord Clive meeting with Mir Jafar after the Battle of Plassey'' by [[Francis Hayman]], depicting [[Robert Clive]] meeting with [[Mir Jafar]] after the battle of Plassey. The victory at Plassey marked the start of a period form [[Company rule in India|Company expansion]] which saw them seizing control over the [[Indian subcontinent]] and [[British rule in Burma|Burma]] over the next century.<ref>{{Cite book|title=The Prelude to Empire: Plassey Revolution of 1757 |last=Chaudhary |first=Sushil |year=2000 |publisher=Manohar |location=New Delhi |isbn=81-7304-301-9 }}</ref><ref>{{Cite book|title=Siraj-ud-daulah |last=Datta |first=K.K. |year=1971 |publisher=Sangam Books |location=Calcutta |isbn=0-86125-258-6 }}</ref>]]

British policy in Asia during the 19th century was chiefly concerned with expanding and protecting its hold on India, viewed as its most important colony and the key to the rest of Asia.<ref name="refhdbe478">[[#refHDBE|Olson]], p.&nbsp;478.</ref> The East India Company drove the expansion of the [[British Empire]] in Asia. The company's army had first joined forces with the [[Royal Navy]] during the [[Seven Years' War]], and the two continued to cooperate in arenas outside India: against the [[French campaign in Egypt and Syria]], the capture of [[Java]] from the Netherlands in 1811, the acquisition of Singapore in 1819 and [[Malacca]] in 1824, and the [[First Anglo-Burmese War]] in 1826.<ref name="#refOHBEv3|Porter, p. 401">[[#refOHBEv3|Porter]], p.&nbsp;401.</ref>

From its base in India, the company was also engaged in an increasingly profitable [[opium]] trade to [[Qing dynasty|China]], which had begun in the 1730s. This trade helped reverse the trade imbalances resulting from British imports of tea, which saw large outflows of silver from Britain to China. The Chinese authorities banned the importation of opium, and in 1839, 20,000 chests of opium were confiscated and destroyed in [[Guangzhou|Canton]] by [[Lin Zexu]]. This led to the [[First Opium War]], which was concluded in the [[Treaty of Nanking|Treaty of Nanjing]], re-legalizing the importation of opium into China.<ref>[[#refHDBE|Olson]], p.&nbsp;293.</ref>

[[File: Defence-of-Arrah-House.png|thumb|right|180px|'' Defence of the Arrah House, 1857'' by William Tayler, depicting the [[siege of Arrah]] during the [[Indian Rebellion of 1857]]<ref>{{cite book |last=Forrest |first=George |author-link=George William Forrest |year=2006 |orig-year=First published 1904 |title = A History of the Indian Mutiny, 1857-58 (Volume III) |url = https://books.google.com/books?id=VDmS9noPkbkC&q=dinapore+mutiny&pg=PA414 |publisher=Gautam Jetley (reprint) |isbn=81-206-1999-4}}</ref>]]

The British had direct or indirect control over all parts of present-day India before the middle of the 19th century. In 1857, a local rebellion by a group of ''[[sepoy]]s'' escalated into the [[Indian Rebellion of 1857]], which took six months to suppress with heavy loss of life on both sides; with British casualties numbering in the thousands and Indian casualties numbering in the hundreds of thousands.<ref>{{cite news |last=Ramesh |first=Randeep |date=24 August 2007 |title=India's secret history: 'A holocaust, one where millions disappeared...' |url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2007/aug/24/india.randeepramesh |newspaper=The Guardian}}</ref> The trigger for the rebellion has been a subject of dispute among historians. The rebellion, although short-lived, was triggered by attempts from the East India Company to expand its control in India. According to Olson, several reasons may have triggered the rebellion. For example, Olson concludes that the East India Company's attempt to annex and expand its direct control of India, by arbitrary laws such as [[Doctrine of Lapse]], combined with discrimination in employment against Indians, contributed to the 1857 Rebellion.<ref>[[#refHDBE|Olson]], p. 653</ref> The East India Company officers lived lavish lives, the company finances were in shambles, and the company's effectiveness in India was examined by the British crown after 1858. As a result, the East India Company lost its powers of government and [[British India]] formally came under [[British Raj|direct Crown control]], with an appointed [[Governor-General of India]]. The East India Company was dissolved the following year in 1858. A few years later, [[Queen Victoria]] took the title of [[Empress of India]].<ref>[[#refHDBE|Olson]], p.&nbsp;568</ref>

[[File:Marche sel.jpg|thumb|180px|left|[[British Raj]] era photograph of [[Mahatma Gandhi]] during the [[Salt March]], which gave a critical impetus to the [[Indian independence movement]].]]