Showing results by author "Shashi Tharoor" in History

Penguin presents the audiobook edition of Inglorious Empire written and read by Shashi Tharoor. In the 18th century, India's share of the world economy was as large as Europe's. By 1947, after two centuries of British rule, it had decreased six-fold. The Empire blew rebels from cannon, massacred unarmed protesters, entrenched institutionalised racism and caused millions to die from starvation.

In this explosive book, best-selling author Shashi Tharoor reveals with acuity, impeccable research, and trademark wit, just how disastrous British rule was for India. Besides examining the many ways in which the colonizers exploited India, he demolishes the arguments of Western and Indian apologists for Empire on the supposed benefits of British rule.

For more than four decades after gaining independence, India, with its massive size and population, staggering poverty and slow rate of growth, was associated with the plodding, somnolent elephant, comfortably resting on its achievements of centuries gone by. Then, in the early 1990s, the elephant seemed to wake up from its slumber and slowly begin to change - until today, in the first decade of the 21st century, some have begun to see it morphing into a tiger. As India turns 60, Shashi Tharoor, novelist and essayist, reminds us of the paradox that is India.