Previous Year Question

Dadabhai Naoroji—Correct: Through his “Drain of Wealth Theory,” he explained the continuous transfer of wealth from India under British rule. His famous work, Poverty and Un-British Rule in India, showed that Indian wealth was transferred to Britain without an equivalent economic return through officials’ salaries and pensions, profits on British capital, interest payments and “Home Charges.” He regarded this drain as a major cause of Indian poverty.

G. Subramania Iyer—Correct: He was a nationalist journalist, one of the founders of The Hindu and the founder of the Tamil newspaper Swadesamitran. Through journalism, he criticised the colonial land-revenue system, Indian poverty, unequal free-trade policies favouring Britain and the neglect of Indian industries. He supported Swadeshi and Indian industrial development.

R. C. Dutt—Correct: He was a former Indian Civil Service officer and an economic historian. His major works, The Economic History of India under Early British Rule and India in the Victorian Age, examined excessive land revenue, the decline of Indian handicrafts, adverse trade policies, famines and the drain of wealth. He demonstrated that colonial policies weakened both Indian agriculture and industry.

These economic nationalists established that India’s poverty was neither natural nor accidental but was the result of colonial economic policies. Their economic critique provided a strong ideological foundation to early Indian nationalism.

Therefore, all three persons were economic critics of colonialism and the correct answer is (d) 1, 2 and 3.