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History Optional PYQ Master Pack · Model answer

The Government of India from Canning to Curzon was regarded “as a white man’s burden rather than as a call to creative effort or the preparation for a new era.” Comment.

  • UPSC 1995
  • Constitutional Developments in Colonial India, 1858-1935

Spanning nearly half a century (1858–1905), the administration from Canning to Curzon was governed by a paternalist, authoritarian ethos — India as a trust to be managed by a superior race, not a polity to be prepared for eventual self-rule.

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What the full answer covers

  • The Post-1857 Turn to Caution and Racial Distance
  • The Ilbert Bill Controversy: Racial Attitudes Exposed
  • Curzon: The Culmination, Not an Aberration
  • Contrast with the Rhetoric of Trusteeship

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