Social Scientist

The Envisioning of a Nation: A Defence of the Idea of India

Author(s): Irfan Habib
Source: Social Scientist, Vol. 27, No. 9/10 (Sep. - Oct., 1999), pp. 18-29
Published by: Social Scientist
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3518100 .
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18 SOCIALSCIENTIST

IRFANHABIB*

The Envisioningof a Nation:

A Defence of the Idea of India

It is a matter of great honour for me to be asked to contribute an

addressfor the A.K.G. Centre'sseminarcommemoratingComrade
EMSNamboodiripad.I mustrendermy sincereregretsand apologies
for not beingablepersonallyto presentwhat I havewritten,especially
since, as in the case of most people in the Communistmovement,
EMS has been a living influencein our lives. His firm linking of the
freedomstrugglewith the fight for socialism,his steadfastadherence
to Marxism in the most difficult circumstances,the precedencehe
gave to the interests of the people of the country as a whole, his
painstakingcontributionto the implantationof Marxist ideology in
his beloved Kerala,and, above all, his undauntedopposition to all
forms of chauvinism,are elementsof a legacy from which all of us
will draw inspirationfor a long, long time.
In his last days, ComradeEMS showed great concern over the
growth of the communalistvirus spread by the Sangh Parivar,and
over the BJP'sadvance to a position of power in the country. He
thoughtthat a new stagehad arrivedin the politicallife of the country
which demandedan appropriateadjustmentin the strategy of the
Left and democraticforces.
It is in the light of this perception, which Comrade EMS
bequeathedto us, that I venturehereto submitfor your consideration
a study of the growth of India as a country and nation, and some
reflectionson how the nation itself is in dangerof subversionby the
ideas and actions of the SanghParivar.If the study goes into certain
detailsor takesmoreof yourtimethanit shouldhave,I begto apoligise
for it in advance.
In historynothing has existed from all times;and countriesform

* Formerly
professorof Historyat theAligarhMuslimUniversity,
Aligarh
Social Scientist, Vol. 27, Nos. 9 - 10, Sept. - Oct. 1999

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The Envisioningof a Nation:A Defenceof the Idea of India 19

no exception to this rule. Even where geographical features set

seemingly natural limits to a territory,the latter'srecognition as a
country has not automatically followed. The several indigenous
communities inhabiting the Australian continent, did not know,
because of lack of sufficient exploration, that they were all on the
same island; they were also not aware, since they did not know of
any people outsideAustralia,that they as a groupwere distinctfrom
inhabitants of other countries in certain importantcultural ways.
Thus there was no countrylike Australiabeforethe 19th century.
We can see from this example that geographicalknowledgewas
also a pre-requisitebefore the concept of India as a country could
arise.Weneednot be surprised,then,thatsucha conceptis not present
in the Vedas.The first firm evidenceof the "ideaof India"(courtesy,
Sunil Khilnani)is, perhaps,no older than GautamaBuddha'stime,
some two thousand five hundredyears ago (c. 500 B.C.), when we
firsthearof the "SixteenMahajanapadas", which togethercomprised
NorthernIndiaand partsof Afghanistan.But it is with the Mauryan
emperorAsoka'sinscriptionsfound all over India,datableto around
250 B.C., that we find one of India'searly names, "Jambudipa"(the
Paliform of "Jambudvipa"),used in his Rock EdictI, for the country
as a whole.
The culturalaffinitiesof the Indianpeople, isolated from others
by high mountainrangesin the north and by the IndianOcean in the
south, could only be marked more certainly, when there was
knowledgeof other people outside of these borders-people, that is,
who could be seen as culturallydifferent. Asoka says in his Rock
Edict XIII that the "Yonas"(Greeks)were differentbecause "they
had no Samanas (Buddhistpriests) and Brahmanasamong them".
Thus a culturaldistinctioncould reinforcea territorialone. A similar
distinction occurs in the referencemade in the Manusmriti(c. 100
B.C.) to foreigners(mlechchhas):theirs are lands where Brahmanas
do not performsacrificesor the "twice-born"dwell (Manu, II, 22-
24). The listing of India's regions in the Mahabharata or
Samudragupta'sAllahabad inscription or Kalidasa's Meghaduta
underlinedagain a fairly distinctconcept of India as a geographical
and culturalworld of its own. The conceptcould indeedlead to rigid
insularity.Alberuni,studyingIndiancivilizationin his Arabicwork,
the Kitabu-l Hind, writtenin c. 1035 at Lahore,commentedadversely
on the Indians'sense of isolation. They believed,he said, that "there
was no (other)countrylike theirs,"and had no desireto learnabout,
or from, other peoples.

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20 SOCIALSCIENTIST

Alberuni'sown book, whose writing the famous historianK.M.

Panikkardescribedas "a momentin history",is itself a milestonein
the evolution of the comprehensionof India as a culturalunity. It is
the firstcomprehensivestudyof the Indiancivilizationin anylanguage
(includingSanskrit!).This fact remindsus that the consciousnessof
one's belonging to a country can also be reinforced by outsiders'
realizationthat its inhabitantshaveinstitutionsand featuresdifferent
from theirs.
The Iranianshad long extendedtheir version of the name of the
Sindhu river,which they called "Hind(u)"(changing's' into 'h' in
earlyIranian)to the countrylyingalongandbeyondthatriver.Whence
came the name 'India' given by the Greeks, and even possibly the
Chinese 'Yin-tu'.In post-HellenisticIran territorialnames began to
be given the suffix -stan, so that 'Hind(u)' would become
'Hind(u)stan', on the analogy of other Iranian territorial names
(Sakastan[=Seistan],Gurjistan,Khuzistan,etc.). Hind(u)stan,just
like the name 'Hind', is an entirelyIranianword. The style of writing
'Hindustan',as if it is a Sanskritword meaning'land of the Hindus'
is a moderninvention:the word in this form is unknownto classical
Sanskrit.We must also remindourselvesthat the word 'Hindu'too is
of purelyIranianorigin,meaningan inhabitantof "Hind(u)"or India.
It was taken from the Iraniansby the Arabsand Muslimsin general,
among whom uptill the time of Alberunithere was little reason to
distinguishbetweenthose who were Indians,and those who, besides
being Indians, followed religious sects other than Islam. Once the
Muslimsestablishedthemselvesin largepartsof India,especiallyfrom
the 13th centuryonwards,the latterrestrictivemeaningof the word
began to predominate,and 'Hindu' assumeda religiouscolour. But
by the Hindusthemselvesthe namewas not acceptedbeforethe latter
half of the 14th century,when the Vijayanagararulerand, later,the
rulerof Mewar are found stylingthemselves'Hindusultans'('Hindu
suratrana').Simultaneously,the words 'Hindi'and 'Hindustani'came
into use for Indians in general, the designationsbeing used by the
poets AmirKhusrau(d. 1324) and Isami (1350), when they spoke of
both the Hindus and Muslim inhabitants of this country taken
together.
This discussionwould be a digressioninto merelinguistichistory,
but for the fact linguistic usage had some new concepts behind it.
Along with the common names of 'Hindi' and 'Hindustani'for both
the Hindus and Muslims of India, came an understanding of a
common heritage and a composite culture. If we are looking for

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The Envisioningof a Nation:A Defence of the Idea of India 21

patrioticstatementsaboutIndiaand its naturalandculturalgreatness,

then, surely Amir Khusrau'sNuh Sipihr (1318) in Persianmust be
identifiedas the earliestand clearestof such statements.The author
lauds "love for one's country" (hubb-i-watan).His country, India
(Hind), he says, containspeople speakingdifferentlanguages,which
he lists-a list that includes Kannada (Dhaur-samanduri),Telugu
(Telangi)and Tamil(Ma'bari)(Malayalamdoes not seem yet to have
been fully separated from Tamil, so its omission is probably not
surprising in Khusrau'sotherwise comprehensive list). All these
languageshe calls "Hindwi" (or Indian)languages,being used "by
common people for all purposes."Besidesthem, he praisesSanskrit,
the languageof the learned,for its richliterature.He carefullyrecords
that Persiantoo has becomea languageof India,becausepeople have
learntit "since the coming of the Ghoriansand Turks."Here is then
a picture of the Indian people with their various languages yet
constitutinga single whole.
What makes Khusrau'sverses especiallypatriotic is his avowed
argumentof the precedenceof Indiaover other countries.He speaks
of the superiorityof its productsand fruits,its animals,the beautyof
its women, the learning and piety of the Brahmans, and India's
numerouscultural achievementssuch as the invention of numerals
and chess, the compilationof the Panchatantra(Kalila-o-dama),etc.
Clearly,such a comprehensivepicture of India and of its culture,
which is seen not as exclusive (as Alberunihad judgedit), but open
to all, innovativeandtolerant,revealsa new understandingthat could
only have come because conditions had changed. This change was
surelythe one due to the confluenceof the two civilizations,ancient
Indian and Islamic, that had now taken place - a momentous
confluencewhichmy latefriendProfessorAtharAlicorrectlydescribed
as the "medievalefflorescence".
Thisconceptionof Indiaandits distinctcompositeculturereached
its high tide underAkbar,the greatMughalemperor(1556-1605). In
his ministerAbu-lFazl'sA'in-iAkbari(1595) a book-lengthdescription
is given of the cultureof India, it being the most detailedaccount of
its society, religiousschools, learning,and arts of Indiawritten after
Alberuni. Significantly, the Muslim component is also carefully
included.The same reign saw the first history of India, the Tabaqat-
iAkbari (1592), composedby NizamuddinAhmad,a book which in
Persianwould be followed by a succession of others on the same
subject.This underliningof the concept of Indiaas a countrywith a
distinct history of its own could now be reinforcedby the long and

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22 SOCIALSCIENTIST

stable unity given to Indiaby the Mughal Empire- an instrumentof

unity visibleto the non-literateand the ordinarypeople as well. Tara
Chand (1928), indeed, arguedin a much-quotedpassage that such
dominance by a single power gave to India "a political uniformity
and a sense of largerallegiance",necessaryfor sustainingthe sense
of a single country.
We see, then, how the idea of India was formed, and enriched
step by step. The sense of a singlecountrywas undoubtedlystronger
in the Mughal Empirethan it had been at any other time, so far as
the evidenceof historicalrecordsgoes. However,its entityas a country
did not yet make India a "nation", which it could only be when
loyalty to the country as a political unit was demanded.In a much
acclaimed book, Imagined Communities,first published in 1983,
BenedictAndersonhas sought to portraythe "nation"as mainlythe
productof imagination.So, indeed,it is; but is this not the case with
all kinds of communities?The religiouscommunity,far from being
natural, is even more a product of pure imagination.It is largely a
question of words: historianshave long spoken of "consciousness"
(e.g. "nationalconsciousness")insteadof "imagination",andyet that
word did not make the nation seem as unreal as it does after
Anderson'sterm "imaginedcommunity"has been popularized.The
special question to ask, in any case, is why countries- or territories
withinpreviouslyperceivedcountries- beginto be imaginedas nations
at only a particulartime in history.
Not long ago, the development of a common language was
regardedas the most crucial element in the formation of a nation.
The OxfordEnglishDictionary,in the partpublishedin 1906, defined
"nation"as containingpeople"closelyassociatedby commondescent,
languageor history".Stalintoo, while defininga "nation"in 1913,
insistedthat the nation arose on "the basis of a common language."
While "commonlanguage"was certainlyone instrumentof bringing
people togetherto a consciousnessof theirculturalunity,the Marxist
historianEricHobsbawmhas acknowledgedin his study of Nations
and Nationalities since 1870 that "language was merely one, and not
necessarily the primary, way of distinguishing between cultural
communities". India, a country of several languages, could in the
older definitionbe conceived,at best, as a countrycomprisingseveral
"nationalities",eachbasedon a separatelanguage;but we now realize
that if language is not the primary criterion, but rather only an
instrumentin the processof nation-formation,then, Indiatoo, could
emerge as a nation in due course, despite its various languages,

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The Envisioningof a Nation:A Defence of the Idea of India 23

whateverthe conventionaldefinitionsof the term.

While modernnation-statesarose first in WesternEuropein the
sixteenth centuryas capitalismbegan to develop in its mercantilist
stage and provided economic grounds for strong 'national'
monarchies,the majorimpulseoutside of Europehas been different.
Andersonhas called attention to the formation of nations in Latin
Americaearlyin the nineteenthcenturywithout any such capitalistic
development. He underlines the fact that these nations were the
creationsof the Creolesor local white settlers,who as land-holders
were involved in a major conflict of interest with the bulk of the
inhabitants,whetherAmerindiansor Africansslaves.The concessions
made by the Creoles to the other sections of the populations as
componentsof the same nation were certainlynominalor cosmetic.
But if Bolivarand SanMartinare still reveredas nation-builders,the
reason lies surelyin that they liberatedlargeareasof South America
from Spanishcolonialism,which was drainingaway a large amount
of wealth from that continent. Anderson does not see that it is
primarilythis resistanceto colonialismthat was the source of Latin
Americannationalismand of the creationof LatinAmericannations;
the configurations of their actual boundaries, or even distinct
identities, in relation to each other, are only of very secondary
significance.
But if resistanceto colonialism was the main source of nation-
formation in Latin America, that process would not have been
undertakenhad the rebelsnot have accessto ideasabout nationhood.
Theseideaswerenot indigenous,eitherin LatinAmericaor elsewhere.
The Creoles, despite the limited extent of higher education among
them,which Andersoncommentson, spokeSpanishandweredirectly
inspired by the great slogans of the French Revolution (1789),
"Liberty,Equality,Fraternity." all the nationscreated
Not surprisingly,
out of the Spanishdominionsin the Americanhemispherewere firmly
establishedas republics,though behindthat facadetherewas no real
democracy.In this respect,one can contrastthe LatinAmericanrevolts
with our own Rebellionof 1857. The latter,despiteits massivescale,
remainedbereftof any explicit consciousnessof nationhood(at even
the level of the politicalunityof the entirecountry)amongits leaders.
The visionary that he was, Ram Mohan Roy had seen in 1830
that India could not be a nation becauseit was "dividedup among
castes."He could, perhaps,haveadded,"andreligiouscommunities"
afterthe word "castes".Unlessthe Indianscould breakthese barriers
which gave themdifferentidentities,of whichthe senseof attachment

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24 SOCIALSCIENTIST

to the countrywas only one and not very primaryeither,they could

not constitutethemselvesinto a nation. The social barriers,therefore,
needed to be removed from people's minds, and for the caste and
other parochialidentitiesto recede,beforetrue nationalismcould be
generated.Here the importanceof bourgeois-democraticideas that
IndiareceivedfromEuropecannotbe overstressed.This was the basis
of what Marx called the "regeneratingrole" of colonialism, which
by forcing the pace of English-languagedessiminationfor its own
convenienceof administration,openedthe doors to the entryof these
ideas. Marx in his article, "The Future Results of BritishRule in
India"(1853) acutelypredictedhow the Indians,armedby theseideas
and assisted by the spreadof modernmaterialcircumstances,could
become "strongenough to throw off the Englishyoke altogether."
One has to recognisze that the movements of social reform,
directed to removing those barriersthat separatedvast sections of
our people and bredinnumerableparochialloyalties,originatedfrom
the influx of modernideas.To portraytheseeffortsas stemmingfrom
any past traditions in our civilization, are absolutely inhistorical,
whether one has in mind the "Hindu"or "Islamic"heritages.The
concept of "nationhood",which is, in essence, the primacy of the
nationalidentityover all otherparochial,caste, communityand local
identities,could come into being only once the social barriersbegan
to loosen theirvice-likegrip over people'sminds.For this reason,the
social reform movements,initiated by Ram Mohan Roy (d. 1832)
and given their strongorientationby KeshavChandraSen (d. 1884),
in respect of both caste disabilitiesand women's played the role of
building blocks for the Indian nation. In 1909 in his Hind Swaraj,
Gandhiapplaudedthe institutionsof old India, and was very casual
about their defects.But upon his returnto Indiafrom SouthAfricain
1915, the fight against caste disabilities and for women's equality
became an ever-growingpart of his endeavours;and he showed by
his own practice, as no other individualIndianleader did, that this
fight was inseparablefrom the strugglefor national independence.
Incidentally,this was at the root of the discordbetweenhim and the
forces that have now adopted the "Hindutva"signboard.
While the social reformmovementstook the initialstepstowards
making the people feel one by overcomingthe frontierscreated by
our pastculture,India'stransformationinto a nationreceivedimpetus
fromyet anotherandmoredeliberatesource:the visionof the national
destinyas one of deliverancefromexploitationand impoverishment.
This notion of economic liberationtoo had its external sources: it

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The Envisioningof a Nation:A Defence of the Idea of India 25

received its earliest inspiration,again, from the FrenchRevolution;

and both the economicnationalismof Listand the socialismof Marx
would in time exert their influenceson Indiannationalists.
One of the importantfeaturesof Indiannationalismfrom its very
early stageswas thus the criticismof Britain'seconomic exploitation
of India. The "Grand Old Man" of the National Movement,
DadabhoyNaoroji, drew attentionconstantlyfrom the 1870's to the
impoverishmentimposed on India as a result of this exploitation.
The very title of his book, Poverty and UnBritish Rule in India
(publishedin 1901), calledattentionto the factthatthegreatestvictims
of Britishrule were the poverty-strickenmassesof India. In his two-
volume Economic History of British Rule in India (1901, 1903),
constituting a detailed critique of Britisheconomic performancein
India,the redoubtableR.C. Dutt took a similarposition. "Everytrue
Indian hopes", he said at one place, "that the small cultivation of
India will not be replaced by landlordism",as if it was the small
peasantfor whom the patrioticheartmust beat. It was not that these
early nationalists were unmindful of the interests of the small,
emergingmiddleclasses and businessinterests;that these were often
at the centre of their interestsbecomes clear from Bipan Chandra's
detailed work, The Rise and Growth of Economic Nationalism in
India. This concern for the middle classes was not concealed, but,
indeed,proclaimedby the nationalistspokesmen:theirargumentwas
that the educatedmiddleclassesnot only representedtheirown cause,
but also that of thee unlettered masses, who could not represent
themselves.Despite the limitationsof this position, the fact that the
nationalists made the conditions of the poor a critical element of
their argumentsagainstcolonialismassumedcardinalimportancein
the later popularizationof nationalistideology. Simplifiedversions
of the economiccritiquesof colonialism,such as the one in Gandhiji's
Hind Swaraj,appearedin pamphletsand bookletsin practicallyevery
Indianlanguage.As theseideasbecamemorewidespread,thesehelped
to open the doors to mass participationin the National Movement
itself.
Thisparticipationcamewith Gandhi'sown experimentswith mass
mobilization (beginningwith the Champaranpeasants'satyagraha,
1917), the Non-Cooperationand Khilafatmovement,the emergence
of the Left in the 1920s, and the heavy peasant and women's
participation in the Civil Disobedience of 1930-31. This
transformation of the Movement demanded a more specific
delineationof the nation'sfuture, once it came to be free. Neither a

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26 SOCIALSCIENTIST

moderncapitaliststate, the dreamof the Moderates,nor a reformed

Old India of Gandhiji'sHind Swaraj,could meet the aspirationsof
the classes that had now become the main force behind freedom
struggle. This new situation became the basis for one of the most
importantdocumentsof the IndianNational Congress,the Karachi
Resolution on FundamentalRights.
This resolution began by declaringthat "politicalfreedommust
includerealeconomicfreedomof the starvingmillions."It envisioned
Indiaas a democraticstate,with full adultsuffrage,equalityof women
with men, constitutional observanceof "neutrality"in matters of
religionand protectionof minorities.Provisionswere to be made for
protecting labour and for securing land, rent reduction and relief
from indebtednessto peasants. Capitalismtoo would be restricted;
"TheStateshall own or control key industriesand services,railways,
waterways, shipping and other means of public transport."It thus
envisageda strong Public Sectorto sustain industrialgrowth in the
interestof the countryas a whole. (SAHMAT,New Delhi, has done
well to republishthe text of the resolutionin its booklet,IndianPeople
in the Strugglefor Freedom.)
The KarachiResolutionrepresentedthe common vision for free
India shared by all sections of the National Movement, from the
Gandhians to the Communists. It was a pledge, repeated in the
Congressmanifestofor the 1937 elections,on the basis of which the
people were asked to give their supportto the National Movement.
There were two streams, however, which were fundamentally
opposed to not only the principlesof the KarachiResolution, but to
the very idea of a democratic,secularnation. These were the Hindu
and Muslim communalists.
At an earlystage of the developmentof freedomstrugglereligion
played an undeniablepart as an instrumentof mobilization. The
appeal to religion by the rebels of 1857 (beginningwith the issue of
greasedcartridges)is part of every school-textbook account of that
great event. In the 1890's Tilak invoked religion to develop a
nationalist ideology, which sometimesseemed as anti-Muslimas it
was anti-British.Aurobindo Ghosh provided a philosophical basis
for this "Hindunationalism."On the otherhand,JamaluddinAfghani,
who had spent some years in India (1877-82), developedhis theory
of Pan-Islamism,to unite peoples of all Muslim countries against
imperialism.Clearly,while radicallyanti-imperialist,suchcommunal
versions of nationalismcould only help to divide the Indianpeople.
JamaluddinAfghani had himself been acute enough to realize that

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The Envisioningof a Nation:A Defence of the Idea of India 27

Hindus and Muslimsmust remainunitedin Indiain orderto oppose

the British,as he told an audienceof the young Muslimsof Calcutta;
and his pan-Islamic"nation"did not thereforeinclude India. Tilak
too, in his later days, shifted more and more to an accommodative
position, makingHindu-Muslimunity his specialobject:he was the
main architect of the Congress-LeaguePact of 1916, where the
Congressacceptedseparateelectoratesfor Muslimsand the Muslim
League adopted the ideal of "Home Rule" (Swaraj)for India. This
was a major act of recognition that India was a nation equally
composed of all its religiouscommunities,as the foundingfathersof
the IndianNational Congress,to their honour,had always insisted.
As the National Movementgrew in scale and beganto assumea
truly mass character,its mobilizationof peasants and workers, and
women and other socially and economicallyoppressedstrataon the
basis of increasinglyradical set of promises for "the 98 per cent"
(C.R. Das, 1922) grew apace. This resultedin a growing inclination
of propertiedinterests, especially landlords, to shift to communal
positions in orderto oppose the freedomstruggle.This receiveddue
encouragementfromimperialism,andthe SimonCommissionReport
(1930) labouredto deny on the basis of its religious (and linguistic)
diversitiesthat Indiawas a nation at all. The groundwas thus being
createdfor a full-blown "two-nation"theory.
It is often supposedthat the "two-nation"theorywas a product
only of Muslim communalism.The fact, however,is that the slogan
"Hindu, Hindi, Hindustan" has a much older history than of
"Pakistan",a term only coined by C. RahmatAli in the 1930s, and
adopted by the Muslim Leagueonly after its LahoreResolution of
1940. The RashtriyaSwayamsevakSangh (RSS),founded in 1925,
openly espoused the ideal of a "Hindu Rashtra"(Hindu Nation),
which, by excluding Muslims (and other minorities), necessarily
implied that there are two or more nations in India. Hindu
communalism thus had essentially the same aim of breaking the
nation'sunity (and so underminingthe National Movement)as had
Muslimcommunalism.It is thus no accidentthat the RSSthroughout
its existence stood consistentlyaside from the freedomstruggle.
The Partition of 1947 was a great test for the Indian people.
Despite Pakistanhavingbeen foundedas a Muslim state, the people
of India decided to retain for the Indian Republic an entirely
democraticand secularcharacter.It was a decision that communal
forces in India have never accepted. Gandhiji'sassassination (30
January1948) was a brutalcrimecommittedsolely to proclaimthat

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28 SOCIALSCIENTIST

opposition. (No amountof publicisedfastingon 30 Januarynow can

wash away the sins of those who shared and continue to share the
ideas of Gandhi'sassassin).
It is a matterof immensedangerto the entirelegacyof the National
Movement and to India'sentity as a nation that those who jubilated
over Gandhiji'smurder,are in power today. Many factors may be
invoked to explain how this has come to pass: the failure of the
Congress,over the long periodit governed,to fulfil its economic and
social pledges;the setbacksto socialismreceivedin recentyears;the
failure of the secularparties to unite;and, not the least, the shift of
BigBusinesspatronageto BJP,as a partyfarmorepliantto its interests
(as the RSS Swadeshiexpert, Mr Guruswamyhas just learnt to his
edification!).The costs to the nation of this developmentare already
enormous.If the demolitionof the BabriMasjidat Ayodhyain 1992
was not enough to humiliateand defamethe nation throughoutthe
world, the orchestratedbarbarousattackson Christiansare addinga
new dimensionto the underminingof our secularism.The Pokharan
tests and the bellicose official statementsthat followed them, have
heavily damaged India'slong-terminterestsin the world arena, all
for gaining a momentaryapplausewithin the country.While public
attention is often riveted to the successiveparliamentarycrises and
public scandals, the new rulers' insidious work of dismantlingthe
secular structure,using TV and press for communal propaganda,
promotingcommunaland chauvinisticmythsin the name of history,
and changingsyllabi and text books to accordwith the new official
doctrine,goes on unabated.The long-termthreatto the very secular
and democraticnature of the Indiannation is, therefore,extremely
grave; and, if this process of saffronizationis allowed to continue,
the consequentialweaking of the nation'sunity and integritycould
bring about a disaster.
It must be realizedthat our nation has beencreatedby the Indian
people aftercenturiesof endeavour.First,as we haveseen, they began
to have a vagueconceptionof Indiaas a countrysome two thousand
and five hundredyearsago. Thereafter,in stages, as their knowledge
about themselvesand othersgrew,they beganto identifythe cultural
featuresthat were common to them, and to recognizea unity in the
diversityof their religions and languages.But it was their resistance
to colonialism and absorption of modern democratic (and later
socialist) ideas that began to transformIndia from a country - a
geographicaland culturalentity - into a true nation. Indiais, then, a
creationof the Indianpeople, a productnot simplyof natureor even

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The Envisioningof a Nation:A Defence of the Idea of India 29

of blind circumstances,but essentiallyof the people'sconsciousness.

If it has been so created,it can also be destroyedonce ideas change.
In the last ten years or so we have actuallyseen establishednations
destroyed,such as the SovietUnion, Yugoslaviaand Czechoslovakia.
The bulk of the people of the SovietUnion, accordingto all accounts,
did not wish to see theirnation brokenup, as was clearfrom the only
referendumthat was held on the issue (1990). Yet, since the people
were not vigilantenough,powercame into the handsof a smallgroup
that undertook a violent campaign of falsehoods in the name of
Russiannationalism,invokingevenCzaristsymbols,and ideologically
confusing and disarminga whole people. What consequencesthis
has hadfor the formerterritoriesof the SovietUnion,especiallyRussia,
is for everyone now to see, as falling production, beggary and
starvationstalk the land, which once contained the world's second
superpower.
Such lessons are important for us in India. If we too are not
vigilant, if we too lose the battleof ideas, as we did in the case of the
Pakistandemandin 1947, then Indiatoo may not be safe as a nation.
It is, therefore, time for everyone to realize that the present BJP
government is not just another bourgeois regime, and that its
chauvinisticand basicallyfascist ideology would not be modified by
the compulsions of governance,as is so often fondly hoped. Special
responsibilityin this strugglefor protectingthe nation rests on the
Left forces:their great advantageis that Marxismprovidesthe most
cogent argumentsagainst communalismand all divisive and anti-
democratictendencies.As such, it is the duty of all Marxiststo help
build a united front of all secularand truly nationalistforces to take
up cudgels against the forces of "Hindutva" and all other
fundamentalistand parochialideologies. This would be a splendid
way of defending the legacy of Comrade EMS, who had taken to
heart,all his life, the dictumof KarlMarxthatthe taskof philosophers
is not only to interpretthe world, but also to change it.

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