Denis Judd tells the fascinating story of the remarkable British impact upon India, capturing the essence of what the Raj really meant both for the British and their Indian subjects. All aspects of this long and controversial relationship are discussed: the first tentative contacts between East and West, the foundation of the East India Company in 1600, the Victorian Raj in all its pomp and splendour, Gandhi's revolutionary tactics to overthrow the Raj and restore India to the Indians, and Lord Mountbatten's 'swift surgery of Partition' in 1947, creating the independent Commonwealth states of India and Pakistan.