The Company Quartet William Dalrymple in conversation with Shashi Tharoor

The Company Quartet
William Dalrymple in conversation with Shashi Tharoor
William Dalrymple’s multi-award-winning histories, The Anarchy, White Mughals, Return of a King and The Last Mughal, comprise the essential collection, The Company Quartet. A culmination of two decades of meticulous research and masterful narration, The Company Quartet tells a comprehensive story of British Imperialism and the conquest of India. How did a dangerously unregulated private company come to be the first global corporate power? In conversation with bestselling writer and politician, Shashi Tharoor, Dalrymple unravels two hundred years of colonial history, covert political machinations and bloody resistance - the rise and fall of the East India Company.
William Dalrymple - is the bestselling author of the Wolfson Prize-winning White Mughals, The Last Mughal, which won the Duff Cooper Prize, and the Hemingway and Kapucinski Prize-winning Return of a King. His most recent book, The Anarchy, was short listed for the Duke of Wellington medal, the Tata Book of the Year and the Historical Writers Association Award, was a Finalist for the Cundill Prize for History and won the 2020 Arthur Ross Medal from the US Council on Foreign Relations. Dalrymple has been awarded five honorary doctorates, is a fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, the Royal Asiatic Society and the Royal Society of Edinburgh, and has held visiting lectureships at Princeton, Brown and Oxford, where he is currently an Honourary Bodleian fellow. In 2018, he was presented with the prestigious President’s Medal by the British Academy and was named one of the world’s top 50 thinkers for 2020 by Prospect. He is a founder and co-director of the Jaipur Literature Festival.
Shashi Tharoor - a third-term Member of Parliament for Thiruvananthapuram, is the bestselling author of twenty-three books, both fiction and non-fiction, besides being a former Under Secretary- General of the United Nations and a former Minister of State for Human Resource Development and for External Affairs in the Government of India. He has won numerous awards, including the Pravasi Bharatiya Samman, a Commonwealth Writers’ Prize and the Crossword Lifetime Achievement Award. In 2019, Dr. Tharoor was also awarded the Sahitya Akademi Award in the category of ‘English Non- Fiction’ for his book An Era of Darkness. He chairs the Indian Parliament’s Standing Committee on Information Technology.

[@icarus6712]

Finally, a conversation between two articulate, literate and intelligent individuals in India. A rare sight indeed.

[@harjith.d.bubber]

Learnt more here than school…. William and Shashi, thank you

[@felixalmeida481]

Speechless, visceral South Asian indignation here. This remarkably well researched, well documented presentation is phenomenal enlightenment for the vital process of psychological decolonization, not just for every Bangladeshi, every Indian, every Pakistani but, most significantly, for every british individual. Liberation and Equality are all encompassing, they are vital inheritances both for the colonized/oppressed as they are for the colonizer/oppressor. Thank you, William Dalrymple and Shashi Tharoor

[@nshorus5001]

It's not just about what England did but what what it did with the COMPLICITY of INDIAN influential figures

[@ashishsaxena2612]

Hmm a corporation raising money from Indian banks to pay Indians to eventually become incredibly rich whilst bankrupting Indians... sounds so current.

[@josephandrews5467]

Ashish Saxena. The Adani Corporation.

[@ajaxjaiswal3442]

Your lack of understanding about economics is bit rich, uncle. Good luck.

[@ashishsaxena2612]

your lack about the use of language and comedy is a bit like your account balance@@ajaxjaiswal3442

[@elgonm289]

​@@josephandrews5467go back to sleep

[@deepaphooken9276]

Brilliantly told! Listening to the other talks too!! Thanks for putting them on KZbin.

[@arpanasingh8790]

First time learning history in quite different way, yet so profound impact is being created on our minds.

[@lalitharavindran]

What an amazing presentation. These historians are a delight to hear real facts of the past.

[@ekamsat429]

Ironic to see, around 24:00, WD discussing a past Bikaner merchant operating in Kolkata under the logo of a current company founded in Bikaner that ran its manufacturing in Kolkata.

[@AbhishekMurudkar]

I have just ordered the quartet. Cannot wait until they arrive.

[@sbansban]

Wow, just wow - so much explosive info emerging only now!!! I didn't think I was going to watch the whole video but I got totally hooked and have even saved the transcript.

[@shanecallum5990]

Fantastic! Loved it.

[@ajkpublicagency]

Superb exchange. Statecraft is key word.

[@tonyholmes962]

Respect to the Diamond geezers real jewels - thank you

[@brandmanager4595]

We Bengali were the richest of all in India. Bengal was the world's richest economy and highly developed functioning society. That's why the Great Shaheed Shurawardy said, that Bengal thinks today the rest of India will think tomorrow.

[@ajithkumarj887]

Bengal was first destroyed by Islam, then British and finally the Communists.

[@tukai1960]

Very nicely presented.

[@anitamishra6431]

Very interesting and informative

[@Mojo-vu4hr]

boy at 52 mins ....very correct

[@sdutta8]

The one thing I don’t understand in this narrative (and also Mr. Tharoor’s) is why the per capita GDP of India remains uniformly low, in fact close to subsistence level), from the glory days of the Moghuls (1700s), through the British loot, until about 1950. Only subsequently, it starts creeping up, gathering some moderate momentum after the the economic liberalization. This suggests that it made little difference to the average Indian whether Moghul wealth was parked in Delhi or had been shipped to London.

[@ricardoafonso7563]

. Thank you 😊

[@Mojo-vu4hr]

he is son of Hew Darymple Governor of Gibraltar, a man who was once boss of Wellington...a lot of what he says is true but to take the responsibility away from UK and just put it on EIC seems quite edited...the original charters these companies got to trade was backed by the Church and Royalty of UK. similar happened in SPAIN, without the backing of church and royalties this e companies had no power of any sorts...

[@Hands2HealNow]

Please create post time stamps of subject introductions🎉

[@awibs57]

Just spectacular

[@rohitd23]

One 'small' company? Might have been the very start, but it for most it's time it was an arm of the state, having Royal ascent, and many shareholders that were Lordsand others in government..

[@Murga_Mutton]

This was excellent. Shashi plugged in necessary bits and William put everything into a sensible piece.

[@IndoPakCanvas]

Seem's hate has finally consumed you fully. Hahaha. Good to see.

[@Murga_Mutton]

@@IndoPakCanvas Yeah coz I finally understood Quran.

[@Coruption12]

Abhorrent username

[@justcurious40]

It is a lie to call it colonialism by a company- if you remember Mangal Panday, you would recall that the shipment of soldiers arrived. Which company will hand over a prized possession just like that even if it is to the monarch.

[@anupamverma7749]

Absolutely brilliant. it's not just the story but the way these gents narrative it. Hats off! And very rarely are audience questions so analytical and meaningful - well done audience

[@kmhuque5485]

The misdeeds of the Brits in India are legendary. So, too, is Mr Tharoor’s rebundling of the same story. His starting point always is how rich India was. At 27:05 he quotes an Oxford professor (of course, it has to be Oxford) to say “India was such a rich country ……. Its economy was 27% of the global GDP.” That raises a question. The US economy is now 24% of the worlds. That means that India then was richer than the US is now, in comparative terms. Then he says that in 1700 the revenue collected by Aurangzeb was more than every single European monarch combined (sic). Mr. Dalrymple, in this book “The Anarchy”, quotes historian Shireen Moosavi’s research which found that “the Mughal state appropriated 56.7 per cent of the total produce”. So, my question is: If India was so rich, and if the Moghul’s treasury collected so much tax, where did it all that money go? Yes, we know, it went into tombs, mosques, gardens, durbars, poets, musicians, and such like. What else? What public goods did those revenues produce? And, particularly, where was education? How many schools? Was there even a single printing press in their whole empire? The avarice of the Brits, their loot and plunder are all well-known, recorded in meticulous detail by the Brits themselves. The villains are well known. Repeatedly churning out stories of their villainy only allows us to continue to wallow in the comfort of victimhood, leaving the most important questions unanswered: Why did we fall like ninepins to the Brits in spite of our greater wealth, much larger population, much greater natural resources? Mir Jafars and Jsagat Seths are but fall guys. About time we started looking for causes, not villains.

[@DipakBose-bq1vv]

We know the villains; they are very well known. It took some one hundred years at least for the EIC to occupy India. It did not happen within a few months.

[@andrewwilliams3137]

There is another explanation. The total GDP of the world grew faster than the GDP of India. India's GDP increased under the British but not as much as in the West. "The statistic that India produced 25 per cent of world output in 1800 and 2 to 4 per cent of it in 1900 does not prove that India was once rich and became poor. It only tells us that industrial productivity in the West increased four to six times during this period...National income statistics do not show that during British rule the Indian economy became steadily poorer". Source: Tirthankar Roy, Professor of Economic History, born and educated in India.

[@andrewwilliams3137]

What if the only reason in the first place the Indian subcontinent had an estimated 25% of global GDP was because it had over 20% of the world's population. That's how it was first calculated. India's GDP before the C19th can only be estimated. For these early years 'population size is the far more important multiplier in the equation' as it's assumed incomes were little more than twice subsistence levels in a premodern, preindustrial agrarian society like In the Indian subcontinent. So the total GDP calculated is based on this low estimate of income multiplied by the historical population size. Search for List of regions by past GDP (PPP)

[@himmsingz]

Well, Hindoostan was the richest territory in the world during the Mughal times. Bhakts may not like to acknowledge that!

[@Shahi-bangalah_1352]

Well technically speaking,The first asian power to defeat a European power were the Persians(parthians) defeating the romans If I'm not mistaken.

[@myfeedback572]

What I’m most surprised about is that non-South-Asians audience are absent.

[@user-rr5mq4em5w]

Well the sinhalese defeated porugese, dutch and english in head to head battles... Anyone can defeat any army if u have the will....

[@felixalmeida481]

Is this meant to be an exercise in frustration tolerance? WHERE ARE THE SLIDES?!! Surely this couldn’t have been by design; you must have intended to have your visuals compliment and enhance your verbal presentation. IS THERE ANY WAY TO SALVAGE THIS UNFORTUNATE ERROR? There must be a recording of the slides that could be presented alongside the conversation. This was uploaded onto KZbin a mere 7 months ago today (March 8/‘23). If there is someone monitoring these comments, please take heed and REPLY. Thank you

[@felixalmeida481]

My sincere apologies! Allow me please to eat crow, while I type this exposé of my petulant impatience. Had I just allowed myself to watch the video a few moments longer, the slides would have appeared. My rant, my lesson, my apology.

[@Hands2HealNow]

Current relevance 48:00

[@dara_1989]

so ... it should be called THE 1857 REVOLUTION

[@musicmania1959]

Sashi benefits from research done by Darymple

[@akshayakumarpatra1850]

Those distort our History, promote anti Hindu agenda Cong leaders love to invite them and give importance.

[@winterstarr108]

Long & short of it that none of the Kings, Sultans and whatever figure heads they were on coins etc. - an abiding shame that none of them could shed their ego, unite and drive the Brits out of the country. It's only after the country had been reduced to shambles, abject poverty and dubbed a third world country did the Brits leave for the politicians in India to do whatever they wanted to. Yet an another disgrace, this story has come in to the open after over 75 years after independence. Most likely, it has not been taught in schools. After all this, unregulated population, poor quality of life of past 75 years - and complete lack of awareness of how wealth of the country was stolen by the Brits - make it a pathetic & sad tale. Had it been the Americans, they would have been breathing fire and going to the end of the Earth & made incredible noise about it all. And likely recovered most of the loot.

[@andrewwilliams3137]

You underestimate the benefits from British trade and investment and from industrialisation of India's economy. Under the British an increase in Indian population also occurred with an increase of GDP per capita. "The share of factories in industrial employment of British India increased from almost zero in 1850 to 11% in 1938, and in industrial income from 15% in 1900 to 45% in 1947...The growth is impressive by any standard". Source: Tirthankar Roy. India was a dominantly agricultural society, it was a developing country. But "India led the developing world in two leading industries of the industrial revolution, cotton textiles and iron and steel. For example, in 1928, 48% of the cotton spindles outside Europe, North America and Japan were in India. (Dunn and Hardy 1931, 25.) In 1935, 50% of the steel produced outside Europe, North America and Japan came from India. (BKS 1950.) Like these factory industries, even the handicraft industries did well in the early 20th century" The world’s fourth-largest cotton textile mill industry emerged in Bombay and Ahmedabad in direct competition with Manchester. 'Between 1900 and 1930, the volume of handloom cloth production about doubled...The second source was the factory industry. Productivity per worker in factories was about four times that of a worker in the handicraft industries in 1900". Britain created an Indian coal industry from nothing, a valuable natural resource for India. Without coal India could not have a modern steel industry. Tata Steel was founded by Indians in 1907 and is now one of the largest steel companies in the world. "By the time of independence in 1947, the port cities of India and Pakistan were home to some of the best schools, colleges, hospitals, universities, banks, insurance companies, and learned societies available outside the western world". Quotations from Tirthankar Roy, Professor of Economic History, born and educated in India.

[@sarvanthulasi8581]

🤣🙂 That guy who challenged is unexpected one. Nice. Poor white Elephant aka william said a lot used "BUT" 😆 I say BS . CROWN/KINGS/QUEEN IS $HIT .

[@sarvanthulasi8581]

So english guy saying soilders or generals wanted expansion but east India company wanted only wealth not wars which costs very much😔😂 CAN A WAR BE FOUGHT WITHOUT TOP HIERARCHY SUPPORT. EVEN RUSSIA-UKRAIN IS WAR FROM TOP TO BOTTOM APPROACH. STOP ILLOGICAL HYPOTHESIS WHICH IS FAILURE STEP.

[@PastPresented]

It was mentioned in the video that Clive fought the battle of Plassey without permission from his superiors. In the days before electrical communication, it was rarely possible to wait for top hierarchy support before starting a war.