9. Owned Entire Cities
It seems astonishing today, but the East India Company once held entire cities as its private property. Important urban centers like Madras (now Chennai), Bombay (Mumbai), and Calcutta (Kolkata) weren’t merely trading posts—they were fully governed territories under the company’s jurisdiction. The company administered civil affairs, enforced laws, and controlled infrastructure and trade within these bustling hubs. These cities became influential economic and cultural centers that propelled the company’s dominance throughout India. Essentially, these urban territories functioned as corporate-owned city-states, reflecting the East India Company’s extraordinary power in an era when corporations rarely held such sweeping authority.
