State of Industry during the British Rule

Date : 18.4.2020
Sub  : Economics
Class : 12
Day   : 4
Period : 5
Time    : 10:45am-11:25am

Learning Outcomes

• State Industry on the Eve of Independence
• Students need to learn the Characteristics of Indian Industry 
• Reasons leading to Backwardness of Indian Industry

A very good morning students.

Today we are going to take up the State of the Indian Industry during the British rule.

With the decline of the Handicrafts , no parallel significant industry was present in India.

India inherited a backward industrial structure from the colonial rulers.

This is evident frm the following points

1) DECLINE OF HANDICRAFT INDUSTRY: The colonial government pursued the policy of de-industrialisation.There was a motive behind this policy which was two fold

   i) To reduce India to the status of a mere exporterof important raw-material for upcoming modern industries in England.

   ii) To convert India into a market for finished products of those same industries

2)DISCRIMINATORY TRADE POLICY : Britishers followed discriminatory tariff policy. It allowed free export of raw materials from India and free import of British final goods to India, but placed heavy duty on the export of Indian handicrafts. ... Machine made goods coming from Britain were better in quality and low in prices.

3) COMPETETION FROM MACHINE MADE PRODUCT : The hand made product made by the indians could not compete with the machine made products of the British Industries. 

The Indian manufactures made goods using hand which took a long time while the British manufacturers made their products through machines ,which was at a faster rate.Thus Indian Industry could not compete with the machine made product of the British

4) LACK OF CAPITAL GOODS INDUSTRIES : During the British rule, there was hardly any capital goods industry to support the slow industrial development taking place in India. Britishers did not pay any attention for the set-up of such industries because they wanted Indians to be dependent on Britain for the supply of capital and heavy goods

Capital Goods refer to products that are used in the production of other products but are not incorporated into the new product. These include machine tools, industrial machinery, process plant equipment, construction & mining equipment, electrical equipment, textile machinery, printing & packaging machinery etc.

5) CHANGE IN PATTERN OF DEMAND : Since it took a very long time to make goods by the Indian Industries by hand ,by the time the good was made sometimes the demand for the good changed.Thus the Indian Industries suffered badly.

6) NEGATIVE EFFECT OF RAILWAY : The railway was one of the biggest boons the Britishers could offer to India.But they used it for their own benefit.Only British goods could be transported to different parts of india while Indian goods did not have that luxury so it took a long time to reach different parts of the country whereas the British goods were transported easily.Thus the Indian industry suffered huge losses.

I now invite you to watch the video and you are requested to make notes for yourself.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AQhq9gObbVU