Colonial Continuity

Keir Starmer’s recent arrival in Mumbai with a 100-strong entourage of British CEOs, vice-chancellors and cultural grandees had all the trappings of an imperial roadshow. His rhetoric was lofty and all about “partnership” and “shared ambition” and “a new era” with India. Yet, behind the handshakes and trade deals lies an older, more cynical truth that Britain’s interest in India remains extractive. It wants the profits of partnership without the reciprocity of openness.

Starmer’s historic visit, the first by a Labour prime minister in decades, was sold as a new chapter in bilateral relations. The much-vaunted UK–India trade deal, he claimed, would be a launchpad for British leadership in technology, life sciences and renewable energy. The subtext was obvious that India’s booming market and talent pool are to be harnessed for Britain’s own revival.

It is the latest act in a long-running performance. Two centuries ago, the East India Company cloaked plunder in the language of progress. Today, the British state cloaks economic dependency in the language of partnership. The timing of this newfound enthusiasm for India is telling: a post-Brexit Britain, cut adrift from Europe and desperate for growth, sees in India not an equal but a commercial lifeline.

Yet even as it praises India’s ascent, Britain refuses to treat Indians as partners. Just before his visit, Starmer was explicit that visa liberalisation had played no part in the deal. There would be no easier access for Indian workers, students or entrepreneurs, UK ministers said.

The message seems to be that the UK only wants India’s markets, not its migrants.

The hypocrisy is breathtaking. While Britain preaches inclusivity and global cooperation, its immigration policy is harshest towards Indians - the very group its universities and corporations court for tuition fees and contracts. By contrast, visa approvals for Pakistanis and Bangladeshis pose no problems. To Britain’s ruling establishment, Indians are welcome as consumers and clients, not as citizens or co-creators.

Consider the symbolism of British universities expanding campuses across India. The initiative is framed as educational collaboration, but its echoes are unmistakably colonial. In the 19th century, the East India Company exported not just goods but ideas, thus embedding English education to serve imperial ends. Now, as British academia battles ideological decay and financial strain at home, India offers a fresh frontier.

Starmer’s Labour, like successive Conservative governments, speaks of a “modern partnership” with India. From the Indian point of view, a confident nation poised to become the world’s third-largest economy need not play supplicant to a fading power nostalgic for empire.

History, it seems, is repeating itself, if as farce rather than tragedy. The East India Company once came bearing contracts and curricula, too. It promised prosperity and progress, and left behind subjugation. Today, Britain returns with memoranda and campus blueprints, insisting it wants partnership. India would do well to remember that every empire, before it fell, also called itself a friend.