Introduction

What was the East India Company?

East India Company was the name of several historical European companies chartered with Asia, more specially with India.

• British East India Company, founded• in 1600• Danish East India Company, founded in 1616• Dutch East India Company, founded in 1602• French East India Company, founded in 1664• Swedish East India Company, founded in 1731• Portuguese East India Company, founded in 1628

British East India Company• First it was called Honorable East India

Company (HEIC) or often ”John Company”. Based in London.

• An early joint-stock company, which was granted an English Royal Charter by Elisabeth I. on December 31, 1600.

• Queen Elisabeth granted the monopoly rights to bring goods from India.

• The Royal Charter gave the newly created HEIC a 21 monoply on all trade in the East Indies.

• The Company had 125 shareholders, and a capital of £72,000

THE EAST INDIA COMPANY

Arrival in India

• 1612 AD established factories in Surat with the permission of Emperor Jahangir.

• They continued their trading activity for a few years from here and later on expanded their area to Chennai, Mumbai and Calcutta.

Expansion

• First Expansion was in 1639 at Chennai.

• Sir Francis Day along with the company established a Trading Post and St.George fort

• In 1668 The Islands of Mumbai was leased to the British as dowry by the Portuguese.

• Coastal area provided strategic importance to the Company’s trade.

Events

• Battle of Plassey

• Battle of Buxar

• Revolt of 1857

• Anglo-Maratha wars.

Commercial

• The East India Company wasn’t concerned about the local needs.

• It’s main aim was to make profits.

• A large chunk of the profits went to the Queen.

• Thus it’s commercial motive made it a successful business enterprise.

Robert Clive • The foundations of the British empire in

India were, it is said, laid by Robert Clive, known to his admirers as the "conqueror of India". Clive first arrived in India in 1743 as a civil servant of the East India Company; he later transferred to the military service of the Company and returned to England in 1753, where he able to follow a comfortable life-style. But his penchant for extravagance and ostentatious displays of wealth, just as much as his electoral loss in his attempt to gain a seat in the House of Commons, opened him to the attacks of his creditors and political opponents. He arrived in India in 1756 and at once secured the British forces in Madras. He then moved to Calcutta, which had been captured by the Nawab of Bengal, Siraj-ud-daulah, and early in 1757 he recaptured Bengal. Later that year, on June 23rd, he defeated the Nawab, largely by means of bribes, at the so-called "Battle of Plassey".

Robert Clive

Battle Of Plassey • British rule in India is conventionally described as

having begun in 1757. On June 23rd of that year, at the Battle of Plassey, a small village and mango grove between Calcutta and Murshidabad, the forces of the East India Company underRobert Clive defeated the army of Siraj-ud-daulah, the Nawab of Bengal. The "battle" lasted no more than a few hours, and indeed the outcome of the battle had been decided long before the soldiers came to the battlefield. The aspirant to the Nawab's throne, Mir Jafar, was induced to throw in his lot with Clive, and by far the greater number of the Nawab's soldiers were bribed to throw away their weapons, surrender prematurely, and even turn their arms against their own army.

• Jawaharlal Nehru, in The Discovery of India (1946), justly describes Clive as having won the battle "by promoting treason and forgery", and pointedly notes that British rule in India had "an unsavoury beginning and something of that bitter taste has clung to it ever since."

Battle Of Plassey

Basis Of Monopoly

• Colonial Monopoly

• Military Expansion

• Opium Trade

Indian Rebellion (Revolt) of 1857• The Indian Rebellion of 1857

resulted in widespread devastation in India; many condemned the East India Company for permitting the events to occur. One of the consequences of the Indian Mutiny was that the British Government nationalised the Company. The Company lost all its administrative powers; the Crown, pursuant to the provisions of theGovernment of India Act 1858, took over its Indian possessions, including its armed forces.

British Establishments • n 1607, the Company decided to build its

own ships and leased a yard on the River Thames at Deptford. By 1614, the yard having become too small, an alternative site was acquired at Blackwall: the new yard was fully operational by 1617. It was sold in 1656, although for some years East India Company ships continued to be built and repaired there under the new owners.

• In 1803, an Act of Parliament, promoted by the East India Company, established the East India Dock Company, with the aim of establishing a new set of docks (the East India Docks) primarily for the use of ships trading with India. while a new Import Dock was built to the north. In 1838 the East India Dock Company merged with the West India Dock Company. The docks were taken over by the Port of London Authorityin 1909, and closed in 1967.

• The East India Club in London was formed in 1849 for officers of the Company. The Club still exists today as a private Gentlemen's club with its club house situated at 16 St. James's Square, London

Flags

Downman (1685)

Lens (1700)

Rees (1820)

Laurie (1842)

National Geographic (1917)

Ships • Ships of the East India Company were

called East Indiamen or simply "Indiamen Some examples include:

• Red Dragon (1595)• Doddington (East Indiaman) Lost

1755• Royal Captain (before 1773)• HMS Grosvenor Lost 1782• General Goddard (1782)• Earl of Abergavenny (1797)• Earl of Mornington (1799); 

packet ship• Lord Nelson (1799)• Kent (1820): Lost on her third voyage• Nemesis (1839): first British built

ocean-going iron warship• Agamemnon (1855)

The End of the East India Company and the 1857 Revolt

• THE GREAT INDIAN REBELLION of 1857 and the termination of East India Company rule over India just a year later thus ushered in a new phase of British imperialism in Asia. The end of the Company's regime meant that, at last, the British state had to accept unequivocal responsibility for the governance of former Company possessions. Consequently, new governing institutions were established in Asia which were directly answerable to government and Parliament in London, through the Secretary of State for India and the India Office.

• These changes went hand-in-hand with a new culture of governance, created by the trauma of the Rebellion. Military reforms resulted in a shift away from Hindustan as the main recruiting ground for the Indian army towards the Punjab and other regions from which troops were perceived to have shown greater loyalty to the British. The policy of undermining Indian law, culture and involvement in the machinery of government, which had been applied under the last few decades of Company rule, was abruptly reversed.

Group Members

• Drashti • Lasya • Mariam• Aakash • Shlomoh • Sharik • Gaurang• Anish • Burhan

Thank You :*