> It seems likely that without the British having brought "Anglo civilization", India today would be like most of Africa today.
India was keeping pace with the rest of world, and leading in many ways, quite nicely for thousands of years before the 1600s. It happened to be under continuous foreign occupation at just the time the Industrial Revolution happened in Europe, and British policies were explicitly designed to stifle the same changes happening in India. Most things that you see today are a consequence of that missed opportunity.
Without the British, it's more likely that India would have been like Japan today rather than Africa.
It's easy to be thankful for British influence when the US got rid of it so early in the industrialization game.