What was the significance of battle of Plassey in Indian history? How different would India be today if the Battle hadn't been lost?
Answers
Battle of Plassey or not, I still think the British would've captured the whole of India soon after.The Mughal Empire was on already on its last legs and there was no rival power that could take over & rule the whole of India. The Marathas were the closest big power but they were saddled with in-fighting and lack of a leader like Shivaji. Although some of the Peshwas were able rulers & good military men, the said in-fighting and other factors derailed their efforts to build an empire.Power was getting decentralised with Bengal, Awadh, Hyderabad etc emerging as regional centres (though still symbolically acknowledging Mughal suzerainty) and they emerged partly due to the weakening of the Mughal power.The British were the only power who were ambitious on a large scale and they had long known that they had struck gold with India. The Industrial Revolution in Britain also hastened their need for resources.Their other European rivals in India like the Portuguese or Dutch had a small presence by then and didn't offer much of a threat to them. Only the French posed a threat, with whom they fought in India, quite a few times, with each such war coinciding with the wars fought between their countries in Europe & Americas. But they took care of the French threat as well.Thus the British would've taken over at some point or the other, since India wasn't united in any manner, whether at a people to people level or under a single, powerful ruler.