भारत में अंग्रेजी राज (पण्डित सुन्दरलाल - ब्रिटिश औपनिवेशिक लूट व षड्यन्त्रों का प्रामाणिक इतिहास)

४२ पुस्तक प्रवेश
कम्पनी के पाप
एक और अंगरेज़ लेखक डॉक्टर रसल लिखता है—
"ईस्ट इण्डिया कम्पनी के भारतीय शासन को आरम्भ से
ही बड़े बड़े पापों ने कलुषित कर रक्खा था, × × × लगातार
अनेक पीढ़ियों तक बड़े से बड़े सिविल और फ़ौजी अफ़सरों से
लेकर छोटे से छोटे कर्मचारियों तक, कम्पनी के मुलाज़िमों का
एक मात्र महान लक्ष्य और उद्देश यह रहता था कि जितनी जल्दी
हो सके और जितनी बड़ी से बड़ी पूँजी हो सके, इस देश से
निचोड़ ली जाय और फिर अपना मतलब पूरा करते ही सदा के
लिए इस देश को छोड़ दिया जाय । × × × यह बात बिलकुल
dethroned for some alleged misdemeanour. Always some muddied stream
was at hand as a pretext for official wolves Dependent chiefs possessing
coveted lands were impoverished by exorbitant demands for tribute and
then ultimate inability to meet these demands was construed into a treaso-
nable offence, punished by deposition. Even down to our own day kindred
iniquities are continued. Down to our own day, too are continued the
grievous salt monopoly and the pitiless taxation, that wring from the poor
ryots nearly half the produce of the soil. Down to our own day continues
the cunning despotism which uses native soldiers to maintain and extend
native subjection a despotism under which, not many years since, a regiment
of sepoys was deliberately massacred, for refusing to march without proper
clothing. Down to our own day, the police authorities league with wealthy
scamps, and allow the machinery of the law to be used for the purposes of
extortion. Down to our own day, so called gentlemen will ride their ele-
phants through the crops of impoverished peasants and will supply them-
selves with provisions from the native villages without paying for them.
And down to our own day it is common with the people in the interior to
run into the woods at sight of a European."—Social Statics, by Herbert
Spencer.