Rafe Heydel-Mankoo has launched a fierce attack on proposals to remove a controversial statue from outside the Foreign Office, declaring the campaign represents a "war on our history."
The historian responded furiously on GB News today to calls from Labour peer Baroness Thangam Debbonaire for the removal of the Robert Clive monument in Whitehall.
Baroness Debbonaire argued during an Edinburgh International Book Festival appearance that the Grade II listed bronze sculpture damages Britain's diplomatic ties with India.
The former shadow culture secretary, who lost her Bristol West parliamentary seat in the last election, insisted that Indian diplomats, trade ministers and ambassadors should not be forced to encounter the monument when visiting the Foreign Office.
Rafe Heydel-Mankoo was left furious at the idea
|GB NEWS
Heydel-Mankoo said: "Baroness Debbonaire is a poster child for the nihilistic, destructive, self-loathing that’s sweeping the nation right now.
"She’s symbolic of the left’s long march through our institutions. Here we have, once again, a failed politician and woke ideologue who is now untouchable in the House of Lords, able to preach anti-British ideology free from any consequences.
"Clive of India has been unfairly attacked and maligned for a very long time.
"That doesn’t mean he was perfect and I’m not here to defend the excesses of the East India Company, far from it but as a society, why are we no longer mature enough to understand that no figure from history is as pure as the driven snow?
"If we erase people from the past, we also erase huge sections of our history. When we walk through our streets and public squares, we see monuments to the people who made Britain what it is today.
"Much of that will be good, some of it will be bad, and some of it will be both good and controversial at the same time.
"This politically correct desire to delete our past is immature, undemocratic, and philistine."
The monument stands in King Charles Street, depicting Clive in formal attire with his hand on his sword pommel whilst holding documents.
Debbonaire highlighted that the statue fails to acknowledge how Clive amassed enormous wealth during his time in India, noting that his Welsh residence, Powis Castle, houses countless artefacts he acquired.
"That statue continues to promote him in a victorious mode and as a symbol of something that had universal good," the peer explained.
Statue of Robert Clive outside the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office also known as the Foreign Office | GETTY
She emphasised that the monument provides no context about colonial impact, perpetuating what she called a "wholly inaccurate" view of empire as beneficial.
The baroness argued that pre-colonial India possessed advanced engineering, mineral extraction knowledge and thriving trade networks, which she said colonial forces "successfully crushed".
Robert Clive, who began as an East India Company clerk before becoming a military commander, established British dominance over the Indian subcontinent and has been held responsible for the 1770 Bengal Famine that claimed up to ten million lives.