Robert Clive helped to establish a lasting bond between India and Britain, laying the foundations of modern India.

Edmund Burke tore into the directors of the East India Company, accusing them of doing less for the country than India’s mediaeval conquerors.

In 1877, John Bright told a meeting of the Manchester India Association that he had wanted to put India on the path to independence nearly twenty years before.

The Governor of Bengal accused the East India Company of turning a crisis into a humanitarian catastrophe.

The East India Company’s top agent in India was also the man who put Calcutta on the world map.

As Governor of Bengal, Robert Clive hoped to use his powers and his formidable reputation to make the East India Company mend its ways.