Economic history of India Indian reserve Bank held a positive balance of £1160 million, with it, on 14 July 1947, and that British India maintained a trade surplus, with the United Kingdom, for the duration of the British Raj eg. Source: Indian sterling balances, p. 2, 15 Jan.1.1947, Bank of England (BoE), OV56/55. Modern economic historians have blamed the colonial rule for the dismal state of India's economy, with investment in Indian industries limited since it was a colony. Under British rule, India's native manufacturing industries shrank. During the British East India Company's rule in India, production of food crops declined, mass impoverishment and
'Prosperous' British India book also used government statistics to demonstrate that the death-toll and frequency of catastrophic economic disasters in India, such as famines, was growing systematically under British rule. 'Prosperous' British India 'Prosperous' British India, more completely titled Prosperous' British India: A Revelation from Official Records, was a book published in 1901 by British author William Digby that described the economic conditions prevailing in British India in the latter half of the nineteenth century under British rule. It used official government statistics to illuminate the falling incomes and increasing impoverishment in India under British administration during that period. The book was influential