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Comment by farazbabar | Hacker News Reader

How sad that British were able to sow enough seeds of hatred and division in India that brothers in arms ended up fighting each other and separating into two not quite at peace neighbors less than a hundred years later.

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I think its far far more complicated than that. Partition was/is a disaster, so was bangladesh.

However when the mutiny broke out, a huge wave of violence was unleashed, first against the british, then anyone who was seen to be helping the british, then the nextdoor Raj. Finally in reverse by the british.

Of course it is. However, divide and rule was the original british mantra. It saddens me personally how well it worked on the Indian sub-continent and as a student of history I wonder why it did.

Was the history that peaceful before the British got there? I was under the impression that the sub-continent always had a decent amount of fighting and unrest

There was always unrest, true, though it was no exception for the time considering its size. Either way the colonialists did nothing to help the situation but were focused on milking the cash cow. https://youtu.be/f7CW7S0zxv4

But the british only really replaced the Raj, or shoved a hand firmly up the puppet hole. The power structures and practices, along with the sectarian tensions were already there.

Does that make the british blameless? no. The evangelicals that were hell bent (excuse the pun) on taking what essentially was an abusive trading relationship and turning it into a massive christian mission. that corruption of purpose, "natives must be cured/saved" arguably caused the most damage

That hatred and division was there long before the British- indeed, it was the primary mechanism by which the British gained control of India in the first place.

There were warring states and kingdoms, but not hatred the way sowed by british's divide and conquer.

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