Varnam posted this great entry on “The Benevolent Empire“ earlier this week which mentions how British rule ended up with an impoverished India (emphasis mine):
When Clive of India came to Bengal, he described it — in a way all visitors of the time did — as “extensive, populous and as rich as the city of London.” It was a place of such “richness and abundance” that “neither war, pestilence nor oppression could destroy” it.
But within a century of British occupation, the population of its largest city, Calcutta, fell from 150,000 to …

Reacting to the serial blasts in UP today, Comrades A B Bardhan and Shamim Faizi said:
“it was obviously the handiwork of the forces who were hell bent upon creating communal tension in the country”
…but then go on to say that
“the investigation in all these three incidents should not be ”one-track”.
This is not all.
While the Home Minister believes “…these blasts are a result of a deep conspiracy” and “…the motive could be to disturb communal harmony”…”According to the police, the blasts may be in retaliation to the arrested terrorists being beaten up by …