On 4 January 1948, more than 60 years of British colonial rule came to an end.
Many Burmese had fared badly under the British, as integration into the empire's political and economic systems took its toll.
The authorities carried out mass executions as they sought to control the country, people's pride took a battering as Burma was absorbed into India, and the landscape was devastated as mangroves and lush jungle were cleared to create industrial-scale rice fields.
By the early 20th Century, the British had created an impoverished, dysfunctional society with the world's second-highest murder rate.
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