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Deforestation has developed in the central Western Ghats of India over the last two hundred years. A consciousness of the ecological dangers of uncontrolled deforestation existed in official circles during the first half of the 19th century. In order to meet the requirements of the colonial state a centralized system of forest management was instituted in the 1860s. Forest regulations drastically curtailed the rights of access of the local populations to the forests for collection of forest produce and grazing. The Forest Department, being considered as a source of surplus revenue for the Imperial government, had to give priority to commercial exploitation and the cultivation of valuable species of trees over the interests of the local peasants. The Forest Department pursued a policy of gradual eradication of shifting cultivation. The traditional equilibrium between agriculture and forest was jeopardized, as the area of forest that was conceded to the village communities proved too small for a growing population. Periodic outbursts of mass resistance to forest regulations occurred, especially from the 1920s when popular discontent tended to merge with nationalist agitation.
Deforestation has developed in the central Western Ghats of India over the last two hundred years. A consciousness of the ecological dangers of uncontrolled deforestation existed in official circles during the first half of the 19th century. In order to meet the requirements of the colonial state a centralized system of forest management was instituted in the 1860s. Forest regulations drastically curtailed the rights of access of the local populations to the forests for collection of forest produce and grazing. The Forest Department, being considered as a source of surplus revenue for the Imperial government, had to give priority to commercial exploitation and the cultivation of valuable species of trees over the interests of the local peasants. The Forest Department pursued a policy of gradual eradication of shifting cultivation. The traditional equilibrium between agriculture and forest was jeopardized, as the area of forest that was conceded to the village communities proved too small for a growing population. Periodic outbursts of mass resistance to forest regulations occurred, especially from the 1920s when popular discontent tended to merge with nationalist agitation.
==Judgment on colonial rule==
A raging debate continues regarding the good-or-bad economic impact of British imperialism on India. The issue was raised by conservative British conservative politician [[Edmund Burke]] who in the 1780s vehemently attacked the East India Company, claiming that [[Warren Hastings]] and other top officials had ruined the Indian economy and society. Indian historian Rajat Kanta Ray (1998) continues this line of attack, saying the new economy brought by the British in the 18th century was a form of "plunder" and a catastrophe for the traditional economy of Mughal India. Ray accuses the British of depleting the food and money stocks and imposing high taxes that helped cause the terrible famine of 1770, which killed a third of the people of Bengal.<ref>Rajat Kanta Ray, "Indian Society and the Establishment of British Supremacy, 1765-1818," in ''The Oxford History of the British Empire: vol. 2, The Eighteenth Century'' ed. by P. J. Marshall, (1998), pp 508-29</ref>
On the other hand, P. J. Marshall shows that recent scholarship has reinterpreted the received view that the prosperity of the formerly benign Mughal rule gave way to poverty, and anarchy. Marshall argues the British takeover did not make any sharp break with the past. British control was delegated largely through regional Mughal rulers and was sustained by a generally prosperous economy for the rest of the 18th century. Marshall notes the British went into partnership with Indian bankers and raised revenue through local tax administrators, and kept the old Mughal rates of taxation.<ref>Professor Ray agrees that the East India Company inherited an onerous taxation system that took one-third of the produce of Indian cultivators.</ref> Instead of the Indian nationalist account of the British as alien aggressors, seizing power by brute force and impoverishing all of India, Marshall presents the interpretation, supported by many scholars in both India and the West, in which the British were not in full control but instead were players in what was primarily an Indian play and in which their rise to power depended upon excellent cooperation with Indian elites. Marshall admits that much of his interpretation is still rejected by many historians working in India today, who prefer to bash the British.<ref>P.J. Marshall, "The British in Asia: Trade to Dominion, 1700-1765," in ''The Oxford History of the British Empire: vol. 2, The Eighteenth Century'' ed. by P. J. Marshall, (1998), pp 487-507</ref>
==War and Independence==
==War and Independence==