The period of direct British rule of India, or the Raj, as it's also known, lasted for almost a century. It replaced the indirect system of rule that had led to the Indian Rebellion of 1857, when a mass uprising was staged against the British East India Company, which had been administering Indian territory on behalf of the British Government.

Generally speaking, the Raj tends not to be regarded with much affection with historians, both British and Indian. For one thing, they point to the widespread economic exploitation that became a hallmark of British rule.

Under the British, the nascent Indian industrial sector of the economy was virtually destroyed. This was because the British didn't want any competition with their own industries. As a consequence, Indian industrial workers toiled to produce raw materials for British industrialists, who would then sell the products they'd made back to the Indians.

As these goods were mass-produced, they were a lot cheaper than anything that Indian craftsmen could produce by hand. Locally produced goods lost value, causing mass unemployment among Indian workers.

Critics of the Raj also point to the political repression that it entailed. Under British rule, Indians were effectively treated like second-class citizens in their own country. Political power was in the hands of their imperial overlords, who cracked down, often brutally, on any expression of dissent.

Any benefits to the Indians of British rule were few and far between. But there were some. Educational reforms ensured the development of a literate Indian middle-class, who would, in due course, play a leading role in the independence movement. Political reforms, such as the Government of India Act 1935, inadvertently provided a major source of the constitution of independent India.

Though the benefits that accrued to Indians through these measures were entirely unforeseen by the British, they were nonetheless benefits all the same. Even so, they could just as easily have been carried out by the Indians themselves.