[My use of the term “leading luminaries” was meant to be interpreted sarcastically not literally.]
I was referring to economic advances due to decolonization. What is now Malaysia had been under foreign rule (Portuguese, Dutch, British) for over 4 centuries at the time the British left in 1957.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malaysia#History Despite being composed of a lower IQ, on average, population, having been under foreign rule longer than India, and having fought for a decade a communist insurgency that went on into the late 1970’s, Malaysia’s GDP per capita in 1960, three years after independence was almost 4x India’s.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_past_and_projected_GDP_(nominal)_per_capita#World_Bank_estimates_between_1960_and_1969 Given the additional decade under the white man’s heel, shouldn’t Malaysia have been worse off at independence in 1957 than India? What I believe to be the case is that, with a handful of exceptions, the native rulers in the former European colonies were adept at making up elaborate fictions blaming The Other (i.e. the white man) for their ineptness and corruption, and little else.