Sagarika Ghose in one of her trademark garbage tweets had said ‘Hope Sangh parivar understands there was no concept of India before promulgation of constitution. British ruled from Afghanistan to Burma’. It is easy and perhaps even desirable to ignore this tweet, coming as it does from a twit who is renowned for her constipation of thoughts and diarrhoea of words. However, the tweet is significant in the sense that it clearly states what is the source of many debates/controversies in the country today. For years now and especially since 2014, our ‘intellegensia’, our ‘liberals’, our ‘seculars’ and their kinsmen have perennially been in protest over one thing or another. Many of these protests are the result of an identity crisis that our countrymen grapple with. When Sagarika Ghose says, India was born in 1950 with the promulgation of the constitution, she is effectively denying the 5000 year old roots of Indian civilization. The idea of India for many Secular-Liberals, who vigorously agree with Sagarika Ghose is an India that is American in outlook and European in values. They frown on the vestiges of ancient India that have survived for thousands of years. They are appalled by habits not in consonance with Western thoughts. If they could have their way, they would like to pull India by the collar and drag her into an era of untempered materialism, militant atheism and suffocating liberalism. Two centuries of British rule, preceded by half a millennium of foreign rule have effectively Dhimmified our minds. We have grown used to awe-bordering adoration of the outsider and incessant criticism of our own selves.
Unlike what many belonging to the Secular-Liberal Nexus would have one believe, India is not a 7 decade old country. India definitely did not exist as a Nation-State as the Europeans know it, but surely no one can claim that there can be no conceptions of a nation other than the European Nation State. In spite of barriers of caste, sects,language, distance, geography, India existed as an entity, be it under the Mauryas or the Mughals, the Guptas or the British. Even the Greeks knew the lands beyond Indus as one nation, as did the Arabs and the Persians. From the mountains of Afghanistan, to the sun kissed beaches of Kanyakumari, India has for millennia been one. There might have been multiple competing dynasties, ravaging invaders, plundering chieftains and murderous kings, but the unsfettered spirit of India has prevailed. One Sanskrit shloka, penned centuries before India was enslaved, describes India thus-
हिमालयं समारभ्य यावत् इंदु सरेावरम् |
तं देवनिर्मितं देशं हिंदुस्थानं प्रचक्षते ||
(Starting from Himalayas and extending upto Indian Ocean is the nation created by God which is known as ‘Hindusthan’)
As much as our Secular-Liberal Nexus would like to deride it, Hinduism forms the basis of the idea of India.
An Indian, and this is a term used loosely, from the far South could feel at home in Kashi. A Sanyasi from Assam would be at peace in Dwarka. Differences in language, customs, geographies were overcome with a common spirituality. Instead of harping on differences, a common link was forged. It was this attitude that helped Indians welcome different cultures with open arms. In spite of evident dissimilarities with newer religions, common ground could always be found. Instead of displaying hatred and xenophobia, Indians accepted the good points of others, at the same time influencing others and getting influenced themselves. Unlike many civilizations that decayed with invasions and conquests, Indian civilization thrived with external contact. Tolerance of the other came naturally to the Indian culture. It is therefore justified to say that Hinduism served as the bedrock of an Indian identity. By denying this uniquely Indian base to the modern Indian nation state, Sagarika Ghose and her ilk are guilty of committing subterfuge.
Unlike many religions and cultures, there has never been a mainstream movement in Hinduism to go back to the past. One Sanskrit Shloka puts this as follows-
गते शोको न कर्तव्यो भविष्यं नैव चिंतयेत्।
वर्तमानेन कालेन वर्तयंति विचक्षणाः॥
(One should not regret the past. One should not worry about the future.Wise men act by the present time)
That surely does not mean we should be ashamed of our past. The knowledge of our ancestors who penned the Vedas, who came up with Ayurveda and Yoga, who discovered zero, who devised Sanskrit is too precious to be shunned. There is no denying that perversions and distortions that crept into Indian culture need to be done away with it. But it is unfair to discard an entire body of knowledge because of that. India is comparable to an ancient tree whose roots run deep, devoid of those roots, Indian culture would decay and rot quickly. The birth of modern India in 1947 should be considered as another chapter in the long, sometimes tortuous history of India. It is laughable to consider it as a new book. India should develop and change with the times, but at all times, stay rooted in its unique set of values that set it apart from others. It is these roots that give India an identity of its own. India must embrace its glorious past to find its place in the comity of nations.
Like Iqbal said,
यूनान-ओ- मिस्र-ओ-रोमा सब मिट गए जहां से
अब तक मगर है बाकी नाम-ओ-निशाँ हमारा,
कुछ बात है की हस्ती मिटती नहीं हमारी
सदियों रहा है दुश्मन दौर-ए-ज़मां हमारा