Page:Young India.pdf/289

Rh Hindustan is an extensive agricultural country and the average land produces two crops a year, and in Bengal there are lands which produce thrice a year. Bengal alone produces such large crops that they are quite sufficient to provide all the population of Hindustan for two years.

''Indian Plunder. Adam Brooks.'' Adam Brooks says, (“Laws of Civilization and Decay,” page 259-246) “Very soon after the Battle of Plassey (fought in 1757) the Bengal Plunder began to arrive in London and the effect appears to have been almost instantaneous. Probably since the world began, no investment has yielded the profit reaped from the Indian plunder. The amount of treasure wrung from the conquered people and transferred from India to English banks between Plassey and Waterloo (57 years) has been variously estimated at from $2,500,000,000 to $5,000,000,000. The methods of plunder and embezzlement, by which every Briton in India enriched himself during the earlier history of the East India Company, gradually passed away, but the drain did not pass away. The difference between that earlier day and the present is, that India’s tribute to England is obtained by “indirect methods,” under forms of law. It is estimated by Mr. Hyndman that at least $175,000,000 is drained away every year from India, without a cent’s return.”

Swami Abhedananda. “ India pays interest on England’s debt, which in 1900 amounted to 244 millions sterling, and which annually increases. Besides this, she pays for all the officers, civil and military, and a huge standing army, pensions of officers, and even the cost of the India Building in London, as well as the salary of every menial servant of that house. For 1901-2 the total expenditure charged against revenue was $356,971,410.00, out of which $84,795,515.00 was spent in England as Home Charges, not including the pay of European officers in India, saved and remitted to England.— (“India and Her People”).

Alfred Webb (late M.P.): “In charges for the India