Vrutika Dawda

THIS IS THE END. OH, MY FRIEND. For long, we’ve been sold the story of the Idea of India. The land of Amar, Akbar, Anthony. A syncretic culture where multiple religions thrive, and live with equal respect. I call this the Dara Shikoh narrative. In this universe, Hindi and Urdu are two loving brothers. In this world, Taj Mahal is the stock picture that represents India. In this idyllic country, everyone’s out on the streets singing mile-sur-mera-tumhara sometimes in Hindustani, sometimes in Carnatic. We were fed this absurd and unreal cocktail for over 50 years. Anyone who believes this woolly-headed rubbish lives in the la-la land where people speak in Lutyens English and shop in Khan Market. On Jan 22nd, India that is Bharat, will say Al Vida to the Idea of India. To me, this is the most significant development of this century. Let me tell you why. 1. THE BEST NATIONS IN THE WORLD HAVE A CLEAR IDENTITY: Israel is a Jewish country. The United States of America was chiseled with Christian values. The new South Africa has been founded on Black Nationalism. The Arabs are proudly Islamic. China is powered by Chinese nationalism. Russia by Russian nationalism. What about India? What is our identity? For decades, we’ve been utterly confused about who we are and what we stand for. Are we a secular republic? Does that define us? Is that an idea that will get us all fired up? Are we a multi-lingual democracy? That’s like defining Rahul Dravid as merely a right-handed sportsman. Isn’t it an utterly inadequate description of ourselves? So, what are we? Everything falls in place when we pitch ourselves as the Hindu Civilization. Any foreigner will get this summary. Any Indian will get it too. Strangely, the Congress party and its myopic leaders never went down that road. To them, India was a test tube baby birthed in 1947 with no ancestry, antecedence or lineage. That’s because they were too caught up with the question, ‘What will the minorities say?’ And India paid the price for it with a confused and synthetic ‘Idea of India’ that no one bought. 2. CULTURE IS ALL ABOUT PRIDE: Ask a Tamilian or Bengali to describe their culture, they will wax eloquent for hours. Ask a Sikh, about his traditions, he can go on and on. Ask a schoolkid to write an essay on the Culture of India, it will be a passionless piece filled with vacuous words regurgitated from history and geography books penned by liberal folks who were asked to peddle the Idea of India. I am yet to meet a person who owns up Shershah, Akbar, Shah Jahan, or Aurangzeb as their icon. On the contrary, have you ever wondered why a Shivaji, Rana Pratap, Maharaja Ranjit Singh, Sai Baba, Tyagaraja, or Shankaracharya generate paroxysms of awe and reverence across the length and breadth of our country? The answer lies in a four-letter word called ‘Garv’. 3. INDIANS WERE NEVER TAUGHT THEIR CULTURE: Some questions bothered me as a student. Let me place them before you. Why is Illiad considered literature by our professors and not Mahabharatha? How come no one up North knows about the Tamilian who built the tallest building in India in the 11th Century (Brihadeshwarar Temple)? If sculpting was the highest art form in Ancient India, why isn’t it taught at school? Why isn’t there a single Languages University in India where one can learn any Indian language? Why do our museums have lots of artefacts from the British period and nothing from our vedic past? The simple answer for all these questions: Our national leadership of the past was never comfortable with the Hindu religion. They not only knew very little about it, they also ensured very few will know about it by NOT talking about it. And hence, Language meant English. Science began with Newton. Math with Pythagoras. Arts with Da Vinci. History, with the Mughals. Geography, was rarely about Bharat. All of this will be given a glorious send off on Jan 22nd. The Idea of India will be given a resounding cremation. From the ashes will emerge a saffron proclamation that we are all proud children of the ever-resurgent Hindu Civilization. Irrespective of how we pray, what we eat, or where we are from, we recognize, revere, and celebrate our mothership. Hindu has always been our indivisible identity. And it will be the spirit that will guide us through ebb and flow of time. If this happens, we will turn the page on years of drift and begin the march of the Great Indian century with crystal-clear clarity.