They surely contributed to the mutiny. There were Protestant missionaries whose rhetoric talked about monkey worshippers and the tantriks, and it created a lot of resentment among the Indians.

The Baptist missionaries fared better to the extent that though they were involved in conversions, they did not use the extreme rhetoric of other Protestants. Though the British government often expressed the sentiments that Indian religions should be respected especially in the army, there was nevertheless a feeling even before the 1857 mutiny that the English had not only taken over much of India but were also going to make everyone Christian.

The first Anglican diocese was founded in Calcutta in 1813 and its first bishop Thomas Middleton began attacking the 'fabric of idolatry' in India. His declaration did not gain him converts, but he was honoured in St Paul's Cathedral in London with a marble tableau, blessing two young Indians.

What are the larger implications of this book?

I offer many exciting episodes dealing with the British Empire, though there is less emphasis in it on the triumphs than on the disasters that undermined the fabric of the empire.

I argue that the deeds that won the empire, and even those that lost it, were sometimes valiant. But I never shrink from dealing with the seamy side of the enterprise. Throughout the book I seek to convey the full fascination of the momentous saga of the Empire.

When I began writing it, we were at war with Iraq. I was opposed to the war and I resigned from the Labour Party after being a member for 40 years because of Tony Blair's support for the American war in Iraq.

He legitimised the war, in a way. At the end of my book, I write that in Britain and elsewhere round the earth, empire is more than just a romantic memory. I am convinced it is the embodiment of real ambitions, and that is why nations yearn for territorial aggrandisement.

I conclude my book with the assertion that the craving for power and wealth is an atavistic instinct. And that is why we see a war in Afghanistan and a war in Iraq. I saw one colonial empire in Iraq when we (the British) were there in the 1920s and when we put up a puppet regime there. What Bush and Blair tried to do was a terrible replica of that enterprise.