How many British in India?

Question

At the height of the British empire between the two world wars, how many British were there in India?

Many thanks.

I don't want an answer like Joshua Washburn's. I just want an approximation - how many people from the UK had gone over to India and were living there between the two world wars?

Answer 1

somewhere in the neighborhood of 100,000.

Answer 2

G'day paulmurphy42

Thank you for your question.

My understanding is that there were approximately 100,000 British people in India at the height of the Raj. However, the period also saw more Indians involved in running the public service.

Regards

Answer 3

The British Raj (known from 1911 as the Indian Empire) was the period during which most of the Indian subcontinent, or present-day India, Bangladesh, Pakistan, and Myanmar, were under the colonial authority of the British Empire (Undivided India). Since the independence of these countries their pre-independent existence has been loosely termed British India, although prior to Independence that term referred only to those portions of the subcontinent under direct rule by the British administration in Delhi and previously Calcutta. Much of the territory under British sway during this time was not directly ruled by the British, but were nominally independent Princely States which were directly under the rule of the Maharajas, Rajas, Thakurs and Nawabs who entered into treaties as sovereigns with the British monarch as their feudal superior. Aden was part of "British India" from 1839, as was Burma from 1886; both became separate crown colonies of the British Empire in 1937. It lasted from 1858, when the rule of the British East India Company was transferred to the Crown, until 1947, when pre-independence India was partitioned into two sovereign states, India and Pakistan. Although Sri Lanka (then Ceylon) is peripheral to the Indian subcontinent, it is not counted part of the Raj, as it was ruled as a Crown Colony from London rather than by the Viceroy of India as a part of the Indian Empire. French India and Portuguese India consisted of small coastal enclaves governed by France and Portugal, respectively; they were integrated into India after Indian independence.

As a consequence, the famine of 1769 to 1773 cost the lives of 10 million Bengalis. A similar catastrophe occurred almost a century later, after Britain had extended its rule across the Indian subcontinent, when 40 million Indians perished from famine amidst the collapse of India's indigenous industries.
Over 40 million!!!