sassoon

some facts regarding sassoon
the sassoon general group of hospitals including the david sassoon , jacob sassoon and new sassoon buildings is a very old institution of pune .
the sassoons who founded the hospital were great jewish philanthropists and businessmen .
the world is however round and what goes around comes around . [ needless statement that ]
sample these .
the sassoons were the worlds largest traders of opium . restating that - they were the monopoly sole rights holders to the entire opium trade to china in the nineteenth century .
uncredited quote "silver and gold, silks, gums and spices, opium and cotton, wool and wheat-- whatever moves over sea or land feels the hand or bears the mark of Sassoon and Company".
http://theory.tifr.res.in/bombay/persons/david-sassoon.html

we have all heard of the opium wars . but did you know that those wars were fought by the british army as paid mercenaries [ well almost ] of the sassoon family . theses were fought because the emperor of china confiscated the sassoon`s opium . also post these wars the sassoon family received sole proprietorship of almost all the dens in all of china . the second opium war was funded by them too .

the family set up mills in bombay . these mills did so well that the manchester and lancashire mills were all shut down or became sick . then the family set up endowment funds to alleviate the sufferings of those who lost their jobs .

this is ofcourse not to turn away their phenomenal contribution to india . bombay without those mills would have been half the city it is now . shanghai would have been the lesser . british polity
and poetry would have lost out .
these people were like all great traders . they played a lot with the dark side to bring the light . and they made a neat packet too .
sources
http://www.biblebelievers.org.au/sassoon.htm
http://www.earnshaw.com/shanghai-ed-india/tales/t-sass.htm
http://www.gaycourter.com/FIBQA.htm
a confession . a lot of these do seem anti semite sites or atleast biased . i have not researched this too deeply . i merely collated a few things already present .
as to why ?
well the b j m c research society conference is coming up . i needed a piece to present at the conference on our college history and this is a part of that effort .