Bengal Famine - Churchill deliberately let millions of Indians starve to death

[asianobserve]

Does not merit a response. Let's talk about facts and not emotions.


Facts unfortunately don't agree with you. Amartya Sen's work (which got him a Nobel in economics) and later studies on soil and moisture conditions conclude that the rice harvest in that time period was more than usual. The famine was clearly man made.

Nobody is saying that there was a drought in Begal in 1943. On the contrary the environmental problem were essentially too much water-related, cyclone and flooding of rice fields (it's mentioned in several of sources), and then pests.

 

[Assassin 2.0]

So there was still enough surplus of food and rice to feed the starving poor Bengalis. So what happened?

Read the thread again whole thread I'm not here to spoon feed you things.
For starters under colonial rule poverty was so extreme that people couldn't even buy the food that's why they were begging on the roads.
Even food exports from other state's required permission from government and financial support from government which never came.
And government was biggest empire on earth irony died a death.

Such a heartless people they are View attachment 47469

 

[asianobserve]

Read the thread again whole thread I'm not here to spoon feed you things.
For starters under colonial rule poverty was so extreme that people couldn't even buy the food that's why they were begging on the roads.
Even food exports from other state's required permission from government and financial support from government which never came.

Well poverty was a common theme in colonial times. But even in India, the famine of 1943-44 was localized in Bengal. No famine was experienced in other provinces. So it was not directly due to colonialism.

 

[Knowitall]

Well poverty was a common theme in colonial times. But even in India, the famine of 1943-44 was localized in Bengal. No famine was experienced in other provinces. So it was not directly due to colonialism.

Wow just wow now you are saying that famine was not due to colonialism itself.

Then how come we didnt have famines earlier would you explain that.

 

[LurkerBaba]

Nobody is saying that there was a drought in Begal in 1943. On the contrary the environmental problem were essentially too much water-related, cyclone and flooding of rice fields (it's mentioned in several of sources), and then pests.

There was a marginal crop failure in Bengal due to cyclone and diseases. That is well know. But the Bengal famine being a man-made disaster is something which mainstream historians and economists agree with. I'm surprised you think it's some fringe conspiracy theory by "Indian Nationalists"

All famines in India in the last 150 years have been due to droughts. All except the Bengal Famine of course

"Using station-based observations and simulations, we reconstruct soil moisture (agricultural) drought in India for the period 1870-2016. We show that over this century and a half period, India experienced seven major drought periods (1876-1882, 1895-1900, 1908-1924, 1937-1945, 1982-1990, 1997-2004, and 2011-2015) based on severity-area-duration analysis of reconstructed soil moisture. Out of six major famines (1873-74, 1876, 1877, 1896-97, 1899, and 1943) that occurred during 1870-2016, five are linked to soil moisture drought, and one (1943) was not"

Drought and Famine in India, 1870-2016

Millions of people died due to famines in India in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries; however, the relationship of historical famines with drought is complicated and not well understood. Using station-based observations and simulations, we reconstruct soil moisture (agricultural) drought in...

ui.adsabs.harvard.edu

 

[Indx TechStyle]

Perhaps since I don't have strong emotions on the topic or even on Churchill I must say that I'm better positioned to discuss objectively this issue.

Well I don't intend to name call. I'm simply pointing out that since you're clearly an Indian nationalists you're emotionally invested to this issue

You're anything but neutral or objective or free from confirmation bias. This is what was the reason of your few of venting posts on last page when you were left with nothing but claims when sources with quotes were presented those seemed reasonable.

You're not supposed to reject this all either as venting from "Indian nationalists". Not only because its ad hominem but you have continuous history of pro American/European stances on most of issues, no matter if you have to be rational or irrational. That way, even Indians would become more eligible to comment on moral sides as they aren't aligned to any of allies or axis powers.

No one is denying that other didn't play a role in famine. Indeed winning WW2 was utmost priority for British empire as well. India just like any other colony was an asset of British empire essentially, been exploited to boost the power of empire which led to India's own economic decline. Being single largest colonized entity, UK's transition to become a benevolent power wouldn't have been possible without it given India even was a self funding machine. Both UK's wargames and Churchil's racism too played a role equal or superior to natural factors that caused famine. As when emergency knocked the door, UK chose to use its asset to neutralise enemies at cost of significant Indian population. Policies and PoVs have been elaborated throughout thread multiple times. If empire wasn't there, famine wouldn't have either. Not being an asset was the reason why Republic of India did not face a major famine. Any attempt to refute it is clear a whitewash.

It's a collection of different factors, both environmental and human (negligence, greed, war) that has come together to create this catastrophy.

Churchill being the poster boy of British colonialism in India is an easy target for blame on bad things that happened during the colonial period.