British Empire in India

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British Empire in India, may refer to:

• Company rule in India, the rule of parts of the Indian subcontinent by the East India Company beginning after 1757 and ending in 1858. The regions governed by the Company were contemporaneously referred to as British India.
• British Raj (raj, lit. "rule," in Sanskrit), the rule of India by the British Crown, which lasted from 1858 until 1947. The region under the British Raj consisted of
  • British India: regions directly administered by the British Government India Office in London, and its head, the cabinet-level Secretary of State for India, whose policies were implemented by the Viceroy and Governor-General of India in the name of the British Crown, which served as the figurehead.
  • Princely States: areas under the paramountcy (also suzerainty or indirect rule) of the British Crown, but ruled by Indian princes. The British government retained control of the military, foreign affairs, and communications in these Indian states.
• British Indian Empire (contemporaneously, the Indian Empire) refers to the British Raj after 1876, when Queen Victoria was proclaimed Empress of India.

Usage:

• The word raj, without any qualifiers, has been applied (in the context of British rule) to both Company rule in India and British Raj, sometimes by the same author.
  • Example: "Under Bentinck's guidance the 1830s saw considerable change in the mechanics of the raj, though Utilitarian beliefs in clear legal codes, a simplified judicial structure and a strong executive were only partially enacted." (Brown, Judith M. (1994), Modern India: The Origins of an Asian Democracy, Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press. Pp. xiii, 474, ISBN 0198731132, <http://www.oup.com/uk/catalogue/?ci=9780198731139>, p. 76)
  • Example: "To them the obverse of privilege and material gain on the raj's imperial coin was a serious obligation, seen almost in mystical terms. As Sir Walter Lawrence, who joined the ICS in 1879, put it in 1932, ruling India was "splendid happy slavery ..." (ibid. p. 105)

[edit] See also

Look up India in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

• Etymology of India