As India, with the Prime Minister at the forefront is celebrating a movement of shedding its colonial past, the British are busy clinging on to the vestiges of an irrelevant monarchy. India chose the occasion of the 75th year of its Independence to make a statement to the world that it is moving forward, Britain by reinstalling King Charles III as the succeeding monarch to queen Elisabeth II imposed on its people the burden of a checkered past.
The counter to this point would be since India had a horrific, colonial past it makes sense for India to do away with those memories but there’s no such need for Britain. This is where the whitewashing of history comes into play. The English who among the best Historians in the world have certainly not done justice to their own history. The history books in UK conveniently leave out the brutalities of the British Empire and portray a rather glorified image of its riches and splendid conquests.
One of the biggest ironies in Europe, and especially in Britain is its historical struggle for democracy and its celebration of the Royalty. The French revolution spread the word of equality, liberty and fraternity threatening the Monarchies all over Europe but even before the blood of the revolution had dried, they reinstalled the Monarchy in France.
When Shashi Tharoor spoke at the Oxford Union on the atrocities of the British in India, it made news and became educative material for the Western audience.
The atrocities of the colonial conquests helmed by the monarchy is out there in the minds and memories of people of Africa, Asia, America and Australia.
- The conquest America from the 15th century onwards left 55 million indigenous people dead wiping out almost 90% of the indigenous population. A recent study even suggests the mass killings were responsible for triggering climate change in the region.
- One estimate suggests that, from 1885 to 1908, Belgian King Leopold II’s occupation of the Congo killed 10 million people. And this was only one King and one state in Africa. One can imagine the total numbers considering France, the UK, Spain, Italy, Portugal, Germany too ruled there.
- India, perhaps the worst victim of colonisation suffered death of 1.8 billion Indians due to the to sheer greed of colonisers who robbed India of $45 trillion between 1765 and 1938.
The British Empire where sun never set were the biggest colonisers and the biggest abusers of human rights in the history of this planet. And this was all done by the royal nod.
A slight scratch on the Buckingham Palace reveals that the Queen’s courtiers banned “coloured immigrants or foreigners” from serving in clerical roles in the royal household until at least the late 1960s. And how it negotiated controversial clauses – that remain in place to this day – exempting the Queen and her household from laws that prevent race and sex discrimination.
Just over a year ago the Royal household was reeling with accusations of racism from none other than Prince Harry and Duchess Meghan. Ms. Markle had complained that she experienced racism and callous treatment during her time in the royal family.
The Brits, Germans, French of today perhaps do not associate themselves with their country’s past deeds but the centuries of bloodshed, injustice and racial violence lingers in the subconscious memory of a nation. And time to time it takes ugly forms in the daily lives of people. The passing of the Queen Elisabeth Two was a golden opportunity for Britain to end this falsely glorified past of theirs. In a world that is run by narratives, the headline “End of British Royalty” would have invited plenty of goodwill from the once colonised people from across the globe.
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