Fair skin in South Asia: an obsession?
The British left South Asia by the middle of the twentieth century. Large parts of Asia and Africa gained independence in the 1950s and the 1960s and the Sun was finally beginning to set on the British Empire. The decline of the British was followed by the rise of their transatlantic cousins, the Americans. The American empire in contrast to the British was mainly an economic one. The American dream and the idea of America as an El dorado caught the imagination of the masses. Hollywood, American television and the entertainment industry exerted a powerful influence on South Asia.