Nothing remains of the grand neo-classical building on Leadenhall Street in the City of London in which once beat the heart of the nascent British empire and through whose Doric-porticoed entrance flowed much of the wealth of India for the best part of 150 years.
East India House, built in 1729 as an imposing monument to and headquarters for the Honourable East India Company, one of the world's first trans-global businesses, was demolished in 1869, a decade after the British government finally pulled the plug and pocketed the company's assets. Gone are the fine carvings and paintings, each of which celebrated some aspect of the company's achievements and power - its powerful fleet of East Indiamen, its depots and forts around which grew such great cities as Mumbai and Chennai.
Gone too is the ceiling fresco that once adorned the Revenue Committee Room and the title of which has an uncomfortable resonance in the modern era: "The East Offering its Riches to Britain." But just a few miles away in Conduit Street, Mayfair, the original coat of arms of the East India Company, granted by Elizabeth I in 1600, has been raised again and the company name, lost in limbo for a century and a half, has been dusted off and brought back to life.
Founded four centuries ago by a group of English commercial adventurers, many of whom set a precedent for generations of successors by leaving their bones on foreign soil, "John Company" grew to become a powerful state within a state - a vast enterprise with its own government, navy and army, deploying force in the best interests of its shareholders and reigning over its own kingdom: India. In 1858, it was dissolved by the British government in the wake of the disastrous Indian Mutiny, better known in India as the First War of Independence. Now, 150 years later and 410 years after it was founded, the Honourable East India Company is back in business.
And, in a historical twist that quite possibly might have that most famous of East Indiamen, Robert Clive, spinning in his Shropshire grave, the man with his hand on the helm in 2010 is an Indian. The East is offering its riches to Britain once again, but this time on altogether more equal terms. Post-empire, and even within its lifetime, "Honourable" was not a word many have chosen to describe the activities of the East India Company. The British MP and social philosopher Edmund Burke, the focus of parliamentary disquiet at the activities of the Company, remarked in 1783 that "every rupee of profit made by an Englishman is lost forever to India". Three years later, he led the unsuccessful impeachment of Warren Hastings, the Company's former governor-general of Bengal, whom he described as the "captain-general of iniquity", a "ravenous vulture devouring the carcasses of the dead".
The Company's reputation hardly improved with the passage of time. In 2003, Nick Robbins, then head of socially responsible investment research for a firm in the City of London, writing for Open Democracy, declared that for Indians "it was the Company's plunder that first de-industrialised their country and then provided the finance that fuelled Britain's own industrial revolution. In essence, the Honourable East India Company found India rich and left it poor."
Clive, certainly, was among those who returned home to England a great deal better off than when they had arrived. He started out as a company clerk but soon discovered that, in some cases, the sword was mightier than the pen. Assuming command of the firm's troops, he defeated the last independent Moghal nawab of Bengal at the Battle of Plassey in 1757 - a victory widely regarded as the foundation stone of the British Empire - and helped himself to enough of the nawab's immense wealth to become one of the richest men in England.
Back home, at first he was awarded a baronetcy by a grateful nation. Years later, when he was accused (and then cleared) of plundering, he remarked: "An opulent city lay at my mercy. Vaults were thrown open to me alone, piled on either hand with gold and jewels. At this moment, I stand astonished at my own moderation." But despite such history, Sanjiv Mehta, a businessman from Mumbai - which, as Bombay, was the headquarters of the Company in India from 1687 - takes a benign view of the activities of the business he has inherited and whose fortunes he hopes to revive.
He is, of course, trying to sell up-market tea and biscuits on the strength of the company's name, but he flatly rejects the suggestion that the East India Company was little more than an evil empire sucking the goodness out of India. "No, I don't think that's the case," he says. "That's a very political view and it's a very easy statement to make." It is, he concedes, a nice historical irony that an Indian has been able to buy the company, but that does not alter the nature of its legacy for India.
When the English turned up, he says, India was a collection of warring princely states. Without the Company, "Today, India is a country that would probably not exist. "I am talking to you because of the East India Company - the Company brought the English language," he says. "India plays cricket because of the Company, India has its bureaucracy, civil system, mercantile law, sports, bridges, its railway system, postal system, because of the East India Company. Why is India able to compete with China in IT? Because Indians speak English."
Mr Mehta has certainly done his homework. He bought the brand in 2005, from a group of businessmen who had acquired it from the British Treasury in the 1990s but had developed only a modest business importing tea and coffee. Since then, he has been mapping out his grand plan and getting to know what is, he says, the world's original luxury brand - and one so endurable that it has emerged from its 150-year slumber with a ready-made profile any business would kill for. As it were.
"Over two billion people in the world recognise the name instantly," he says. Even better, "the words people associate with this name are adventure, journey, discover, explore, British, regal... I could spend millions of dollars and still not achieve that kind of brand." It took Mr Mehta two years "to understand the history, travelling around the world where the East India Company had operated, learning about the men who had built the business, the products they had traded in and the routes and the countries they traded with, and the influence that had across the world in language, sport, culture and art.
"Everything we do is based on the philosophy of the pioneering spirit of the East India Company." Then he asked himself an intriguing question: "If the East India Company had not ceased trading and the management had decided to build a luxury brand, what would it be?" Part of the answer can be found in the company's new flagship shop, along with its Elizabethan coat of arms, on Conduit Street. It was opened, with suitable historical resonance, on August 15, Indian independence day, and it stocks company-branded versions of many of the products the company introduced to the western world.
The list is long - and delicious. It includes teas, coffees, biscuits, chocolates, jams, marmalades, mustards, honey, cordials and sweets. Next up will be chutneys, pickles and sauces from India, sweets and dried fruits from the Middle East, sushi from Japan and similar products from China. "That was the East India Company's pattern," Mr Mehta says, "to bring what is ordinary in one part of the world and take it to another part where it becomes exotic. The East India Company controlled the waters of the world and the fastest possible way to achieve supremacy of global trade. In the process they created wealth, but also spread culture."
Mr Mehta's ambition is not limited to nice nibbles and he has ambitious plans for expansion, both territorially and in terms of market sectors. Such a well-known brand, he believes, could be the basis for many up-market enterprises, from leather goods, fashion and jewellery to hotels and travel. Such dreams do not come cheap, of course, which is why he will be coming to Dubai and Abu Dhabi in the near future. "We are talking to a few large luxury partners in the GCC region and we believe that the brand and our positioning are very suitable for the Middle East market, as well as Japan, Russia and China. And, of course, it is natural to be in some way in India."
The history of the company, he says, is the history of much of this part of the world, and he would like to see museums as well as shops take root in the rich soil of the brand's past. The East India Company certainly played a major role in the development of what were the Trucial States, concerned as it was with keeping open its vital trade routes from India and beyond to Basra at the head of the Gulf - though perhaps it might be better, for now, to skate over the details of the commercially motivated sack of Ras al Khaimah by Company men and ships in 1809 and 1819.
On the other hand, these events led directly to the Treaty of 1820 with Britain, the formation of the Trucial States and, indirectly, to the unification of the seven emirates in 1971. In some ways, Mr Mehta has much in common with the young Englishmen who followed their dreams across the seas. A gemologist by training, born and educated in Mumbai, he had been working in the family diamonds and jewellery business for seven years when, at 26, "I realised that I wanted to migrate and live in a place that allowed me to further my dreams". Now 49, he has spent the past 20 years in London, where he lives with his wife and their son and daughter, aged 21 and 18.
What would Clive think? Mr Mehta laughs and says he neither knows nor cares. "I believe in living in the present and building my future rather than walking down the alleys of the past. Life is not about yesterday. You can be inspired by it, you cull from that, but you need to walk forward." But all his pragmatism cannot disguise his respect for the history he has inherited. The men of the East India Company, he says, "were passionate, they were pioneering, and they were very patient, to build a commercial enterprise that lasted so many years".
He has, he says, only "taken custody of an important piece of history. It is not a brand that belongs to England or to India, it belongs to the world. It doesn't belong to an age, or a generation, or a culture. "As the custodian, I have to have the wisdom not to destroy the name and, if I can, to add a bit to it for the future. That is the job in front of me for the coming years." In 2003, Robbins wrote: "In a country like Britain, that is so drenched in the culture of heritage, the public invisibility of the East India Company is suspicious." He put that down to a kind of post-colonial guilt associated with one of the many words Britain inherited from Hindi: "loot".
Perhaps now, with its rehabilitation under new, Indian, management, the East India Company can begin to be associated with something less distasteful. Such as very nice biscuits, for example. @Email:jgornall@thenational.ae
? It was the East India Company's tea that ended up in Boston Harbour in 1773, an event that was one of the landmarks on the road to the American Revolution. ? The East India Company's flag consisted of the Union Jack in the canton and 13 red-and-white stripes, a design that, notwithstanding the above, is believed to have influenced the design of the United States flag. ? The East India Company gave the English language the expression "civil servants", which it used to distinguish its bureaucrats and traders from its "military servants", or private armies.
COMPANY%20PROFILE
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Specs
Engine: Dual-motor all-wheel-drive electric
Range: Up to 610km
Power: 905hp
Torque: 985Nm
Price: From Dh439,000
Available: Now
Our family matters legal consultant
Name: Hassan Mohsen Elhais
Position: legal consultant with Al Rowaad Advocates and Legal Consultants.
Test
Director: S Sashikanth
Cast: Nayanthara, Siddharth, Meera Jasmine, R Madhavan
Star rating: 2/5
WITHIN%20SAND
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THE BIO
Family: I have three siblings, one older brother (age 25) and two younger sisters, 20 and 13
Favourite book: Asking for my favourite book has to be one of the hardest questions. However a current favourite would be Sidewalk by Mitchell Duneier
Favourite place to travel to: Any walkable city. I also love nature and wildlife
What do you love eating or cooking: I’m constantly in the kitchen. Ever since I changed the way I eat I enjoy choosing and creating what goes into my body. However, nothing can top home cooked food from my parents.
Favorite place to go in the UAE: A quiet beach.
At a glance
Global events: Much of the UK’s economic woes were blamed on “increased global uncertainty”, which can be interpreted as the economic impact of the Ukraine war and the uncertainty over Donald Trump’s tariffs.
Growth forecasts: Cut for 2025 from 2 per cent to 1 per cent. The OBR watchdog also estimated inflation will average 3.2 per cent this year
Welfare: Universal credit health element cut by 50 per cent and frozen for new claimants, building on cuts to the disability and incapacity bill set out earlier this month
Spending cuts: Overall day-to day-spending across government cut by £6.1bn in 2029-30
Tax evasion: Steps to crack down on tax evasion to raise “£6.5bn per year” for the public purse
Defence: New high-tech weaponry, upgrading HM Naval Base in Portsmouth
Housing: Housebuilding to reach its highest in 40 years, with planning reforms helping generate an extra £3.4bn for public finances
GOLF’S RAHMBO
- 5 wins in 22 months as pro
- Three wins in past 10 starts
- 45 pro starts worldwide: 5 wins, 17 top 5s
- Ranked 551th in world on debut, now No 4 (was No 2 earlier this year)
- 5th player in last 30 years to win 3 European Tour and 2 PGA Tour titles before age 24 (Woods, Garcia, McIlroy, Spieth)
The%20specs%3A%202024%20Mercedes%20E200
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MATCH INFO
What: Brazil v South Korea
When: Tonight, 5.30pm
Where: Mohamed bin Zayed Stadium, Abu Dhabi
Tickets: www.ticketmaster.ae
The smuggler
Eldarir had arrived at JFK in January 2020 with three suitcases, containing goods he valued at $300, when he was directed to a search area.
Officers found 41 gold artefacts among the bags, including amulets from a funerary set which prepared the deceased for the afterlife.
Also found was a cartouche of a Ptolemaic king on a relief that was originally part of a royal building or temple.
The largest single group of items found in Eldarir’s cases were 400 shabtis, or figurines.
Khouli conviction
Khouli smuggled items into the US by making false declarations to customs about the country of origin and value of the items.
According to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, he provided “false provenances which stated that [two] Egyptian antiquities were part of a collection assembled by Khouli's father in Israel in the 1960s” when in fact “Khouli acquired the Egyptian antiquities from other dealers”.
He was sentenced to one year of probation, six months of home confinement and 200 hours of community service in 2012 after admitting buying and smuggling Egyptian antiquities, including coffins, funerary boats and limestone figures.
For sale
A number of other items said to come from the collection of Ezeldeen Taha Eldarir are currently or recently for sale.
Their provenance is described in near identical terms as the British Museum shabti: bought from Salahaddin Sirmali, "authenticated and appraised" by Hossen Rashed, then imported to the US in 1948.
- An Egyptian Mummy mask dating from 700BC-30BC, is on offer for £11,807 ($15,275) online by a seller in Mexico
- A coffin lid dating back to 664BC-332BC was offered for sale by a Colorado-based art dealer, with a starting price of $65,000
- A shabti that was on sale through a Chicago-based coin dealer, dating from 1567BC-1085BC, is up for $1,950
The White Lotus: Season three
Creator: Mike White
Starring: Walton Goggins, Jason Isaacs, Natasha Rothwell
Rating: 4.5/5
The biog
Name: Salvador Toriano Jr
Age: 59
From: Laguna, The Philippines
Favourite dish: Seabass or Fish and Chips
Hobbies: When he’s not in the restaurant, he still likes to cook, along with walking and meeting up with friends.
The specs: 2018 Nissan Patrol Nismo
Price: base / as tested: Dh382,000
Engine: 5.6-litre V8
Gearbox: Seven-speed automatic
Power: 428hp @ 5,800rpm
Torque: 560Nm @ 3,600rpm
Fuel economy, combined: 12.7L / 100km
Volvo ES90 Specs
Engine: Electric single motor (96kW), twin motor (106kW) and twin motor performance (106kW)
Power: 333hp, 449hp, 680hp
Torque: 480Nm, 670Nm, 870Nm
On sale: Later in 2025 or early 2026, depending on region
Price: Exact regional pricing TBA
The low down on MPS
What is myofascial pain syndrome?
Myofascial pain syndrome refers to pain and inflammation in the body’s soft tissue. MPS is a chronic condition that affects the fascia (connective tissue that covers the muscles, which develops knots, also known as trigger points).
What are trigger points?
Trigger points are irritable knots in the soft tissue that covers muscle tissue. Through injury or overuse, muscle fibres contract as a reactive and protective measure, creating tension in the form of hard and, palpable nodules. Overuse and sustained posture are the main culprits in developing trigger points.
What is myofascial or trigger-point release?
Releasing these nodules requires a hands-on technique that involves applying gentle sustained pressure to release muscular shortness and tightness. This eliminates restrictions in connective tissue in orderto restore motion and alleviate pain. Therapy balls have proven effective at causing enough commotion in the tissue, prompting the release of these hard knots.
Key facilities
- Olympic-size swimming pool with a split bulkhead for multi-use configurations, including water polo and 50m/25m training lanes
- Premier League-standard football pitch
- 400m Olympic running track
- NBA-spec basketball court with auditorium
- 600-seat auditorium
- Spaces for historical and cultural exploration
- An elevated football field that doubles as a helipad
- Specialist robotics and science laboratories
- AR and VR-enabled learning centres
- Disruption Lab and Research Centre for developing entrepreneurial skills
The Prison Letters of Nelson Mandela
Edited by Sahm Venter
Published by Liveright
Squads
India (for first three ODIs) Kohli (capt), Rohit, Rahul, Pandey, Jadhav, Rahane, Dhoni, Pandya, Axar, Kuldeep, Chahal, Bumrah, Bhuvneshwar, Umesh, Shami.
Australia Smith (capt), Warner, Agar, Cartwright, Coulter-Nile, Cummins, Faulkner, Finch, Head, Maxwell, Richardson, Stoinis, Wade, Zampa.
Election pledges on migration
CDU: "Now is the time to control the German borders and enforce strict border rejections"
SPD: "Border closures and blanket rejections at internal borders contradict the spirit of a common area of freedom"
Points classification after Stage 4
1. Arnaud Demare (France / FDJ) 124
2. Marcel Kittel (Germany / Quick-Step) 81
3. Michael Matthews (Australia / Sunweb) 66
4. Andre Greipel (Germany / Lotto) 63
5. Alexander Kristoff (Norway / Katusha) 43
FIXTURES
New Zealand v France, second Test
Saturday, 12.35pm (UAE)
Auckland, New Zealand
South Africa v Wales
Sunday, 12.40am (UAE), San Juan, Argentina
In numbers: PKK’s money network in Europe
Germany: PKK collectors typically bring in $18 million in cash a year – amount has trebled since 2010
Revolutionary tax: Investigators say about $2 million a year raised from ‘tax collection’ around Marseille
Extortion: Gunman convicted in 2023 of demanding $10,000 from Kurdish businessman in Stockholm
Drug trade: PKK income claimed by Turkish anti-drugs force in 2024 to be as high as $500 million a year
Denmark: PKK one of two terrorist groups along with Iranian separatists ASMLA to raise “two-digit million amounts”
Contributions: Hundreds of euros expected from typical Kurdish families and thousands from business owners
TV channel: Kurdish Roj TV accounts frozen and went bankrupt after Denmark fined it more than $1 million over PKK links in 2013
The biog
Hometown: Birchgrove, Sydney Australia
Age: 59
Favourite TV series: Outlander Netflix series
Favourite place in the UAE: Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque / desert / Louvre Abu Dhabi
Favourite book: Father of our Nation: Collected Quotes of Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan
Thing you will miss most about the UAE: My friends and family, Formula 1, having Friday's off, desert adventures, and Arabic culture and people
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
FULL%20RESULTS
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How does ToTok work?
The calling app is available to download on Google Play and Apple App Store
To successfully install ToTok, users are asked to enter their phone number and then create a nickname.
The app then gives users the option add their existing phone contacts, allowing them to immediately contact people also using the application by video or voice call or via message.
Users can also invite other contacts to download ToTok to allow them to make contact through the app.
