NCERT Solutions for Class 12 Indian Economic Development Chapter 1 MCQ

India has been a very important commercialism nation since the past. However, the restrictive policies of artifact production, trade and tariff pursued by the colonial government adversely affected the structure, composition and volume of India’s foreign trade. Consequently, Bharat became an associate in nursing bourgeois of primary product such as raw silk, cotton, wool, sugar, indigo, jute etc. and associate in nursing a bourgeois of finished goods like cotton, silk and woollen garments and capital merchandise like light-weight machinery created within the factories of England.

For all sensible functions, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland maintained a monopoly management over India’s exports and imports. As a result, over half of India’s foreign trade was restricted to United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland whereas the remainder was allowed with many alternative countries like China, Ceylon (Sri Lanka) and Persia (Iran). The gap of the Suez Canal any intense British management over India’s foreign trade. The foremost necessary characteristic of India’s foreign trade throughout the colonial time was the generation of an oversized export surplus. However, this surplus came at an enormous value to the country’s economy.

Many essential commodities—food grains, clothes, kerosene, etc., were scarcely on the market, within the domestic market. What is more, this export surplus didn’t lead to any flow of gold or silver into Bharat. Rather, this was to create payments for the expenses incurred by an office set up by the colonial government in United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, expenses on war, once more fought by the government, and therefore the import of the visible things, all of that crystal rectifier to drain of Indian wealth.

Drain of wealth implies that the primary motive of economic policies in Bharat was to grab most advantages from India’s trade. i.e.; Foreign trade of Bharat throughout the colonial time generated a surplus export thanks to excess exports; But, this surplus export didn’t flow any silver or gold into India; Rather, this surplus export was utilized to form payments for: (i) The prices created for the office established by the colonial government in United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (ii) Expenses on the war fought by the government, (iii) Import of invisible things etc.; All of this led to the drain of Indian wealth.

Under the colonial regime, basic infrastructure like railways, ports, water transport, posts and telegraphs did develop. However, the important motive behind this development wasn’t to produce basic amenities to the folks, however, to aid numerous colonial interests. Roads made in India before the appearance of the British rule weren’t acceptable fashionable transport.

The roads were designed primarily served the need of mobilising the military at intervals India and drawing out raw materials from the rural area to the closest train depot or the port to send these to far-flung European nation or different money-making foreign destinations. There perpetually remained an acute shortage of all- weather roads to achieve bent the agricultural areas throughout the time of year.

Naturally, therefore, folks principally living in these areas suffered grievously throughout natural calamities and famines. The British introduced the railways in India in 1850 and it is considered as one of their most significant contributions. The railways affected the structure of the Indian economy in two vital ways. On the one hand it enabled folks to undertake long distance travel and thereby break geographical and cultural barriers whereas, on the opposite hand, it fostered exploitation of Indian agriculture that adversely affected the self-direction of the village economies in India.

The amount of India’s exports without a doubt dilated, however, its edges seldom increased to the Indian folks. The social edges, that the Indian folks gained attributable to the introduction of the railways, were therefore outweighed by the country’s large economic loss. Together with the event of roads and railways, the colonial dispensation additionally took measures for developing the midland trade and ocean lanes. However, these measures were aloof from satisfactory.

The midland waterways, at times, additionally well-tried uneconomical as within the case of the Coast Canal on the Orissa coast. Though the canal was designed at a large price to the government monetary resources, yet, it failed to compete with the railways, that shortly traversed the region running parallel to the canal, and had to be ultimately abandoned.

The introduction of the expensive system of electric telegraph in India, similarly, served the aim of maintaining law and order. The communicating services, on the opposite hand, despite serving a helpful public purpose, remained all through inadequate.