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We frequently come across this point of view, especially from non-Indians and a few westernized Indians that there was no India as a nation before the brits came to this country.
most Indians seem to have taken the idea of India's nationhood for granted and find themselves at a loss of words and ideas when confronted with this strange (to them) notion.
I would like BRFites to put forward their views on this issue.
Is India a nation ?
What makes India a nation aka what defines a nation ?
Was India always a nation by that definition or is it a recent phenomenon ?
How does this nationhood compare to other 'nations' ?
Rahul
============================================================When we talking about the West, it means those leading empires through the western history, like Rome, Spain, Britain, the most recent America. And the well documented history.
For China, it was Qin, Han, Tang, Ming, Qing, the current People's Republic of China. And the well documented history.
However, there had never been an India nation, until the British came. Before that, India was only a geographic concept without even her own documented history.
abhischekcc wrote:
The bolded part is a completely false statement. India has been the largest economy in the world for 4000 years till 1000AD. After that for 700 years, India and China has exchanged positions 1 and 2. Only in the past 300 years have western countries held any position 1 or 2.
So for 90% of known history, India has been number 1, China and some western country has held that position for only about 5% each. The period of decline of India coincides with the Islamic period. The period of India's extreme poverty coincides with the Xtian/western period.
Last edited by Rahul M on 01 Nov 2010 22:47, edited 2 times in total.
Reason:added comment.
However, there had never been an India nation, until the British came. Before that, India was only a geographic concept without even her own documented history.
There have been many empires in India prior to the British, some even larger British India itself.
Check out the Maurya empire. It was bigger than current day India itself :
Not only was there an Indian nation, despite what the likes of wrdos think, but the early large Indian dynasties like the Maurya Dynasty encompassed pretty much all of the territory of India and beyond, whereas the first few Chinese 'dynasties', including the famous Qin one (founded sometime after the Mauryas), was just a small enclave around the northeastern seaboard, not even close to encompassing even the entire Chinese heartland, much less present day territory.
It's funny that Chinese, who often claim the west portrays them wrongly, happily lap up the same drivel from them when it comes to India.
wrdos wrote:
However, there had never been an India nation, until the British came. Before that, India was only a geographic concept without even her own documented history.
That is a British propaganda for the west. Nobody in europe knew India and British could say anything and concoct any history of India. Even now most of the information and news about India/Hindu/social information in the west is transmitted by western news agencies and western universities. Reuters is one of the oldest news agencies which reported news about India to the west for almost 200 years.
Entire world wanted to trade with India. Columbus wanted to find a route to India and ended up landing in America and started calling the natives of that land Indians. The third largest ocean in the world is called "Indian" ocean because oceanic trade with India was so important for others. Great Britain was great as long as it had India under its control. Once it lost that, it became just Britain.
The notion of India/Bharata as a nation is at least as old as the times of Mahabharata. Ramayana depicts the coming together or stitching together of the land-mass into one nation, evidence for that being Rama being able to freely travel the north-south breadth of India with little resistance.
Marten sahab, I know the temptation to do a comparison is great ( ) but let's first compose our thoughts on India's nationhood. points about other countries can always be added as a rejoinder.
there are some efforts at dating the mahabharat from the unique astronomical instances described in them, I would be grateful if someone can post a couple of such articles, so that we get at least one benchmark of when the idea of India was well in being. of course, the concept of India is first mentioned as the land of the vedic/puranic king Bharat and his tribe which is even earlier. in fact most countries get their name from the ruling clan in their early history. the example of han is well known.
rahul m ji, this article was publsihed in the times of india on 08/sep/2004. it gives a time line of Lord Krishna. I humbly opine that this timeline should be of some assistance in deciding the time of the battle of Mahabharta.
It's now official. The god who took 'avatar' to cleanse the world of sin, gave us the Gita and promised to return whenever evil outweighs the good, had lived 125 years on this earth, much longer than the oldest living man, Fred Hale, who according to the Guinness Book of World Records , is 113!
It was on February 18, 3102 BC that Krishna breathed his last on the banks of river Hiran in Prabhas Patan, after living 125 years seven months and six days. He died at 14:27:30 hours, according to a paper presented at a convention that began at Prabhas Patan, close to Somnath, on Tuesday as the country celebrated Krishna's birth.
"The finding is based on a number of hints in ancient scriptures. Certain dates related to his life taken from the scriptures were then fed into a software along with Krishna's characteristic traits for an astrological calculation to prepare his 'kundli,'" Swami Gyananand Saraswati, chairperson of the Varanasi-based Adi Jagatguru Shankaracharya Sodh Sansthan told TNN after presenting the paper at the gathering of scholars.
might i also suggest that rakshaks go through this site which has thought provoking articles (to me at least).a read through is illuminating provided the reader has the time and inclination! http://gosai.com/writings/vedic-archeology
Most Vaisnavas refer to Krishna as having appeared 5,000 years ago and generally credit Vedic civilization and Vaisnavism with great antiquity. But what hard, empirical proof do we have for this assertion? Certainly some archeological or other evidence must exist to confirm or deny these claims. Herein, we shall survey the most prominent archeological discoveries that clearly demonstrate the antiquity of Krishna worship and Vaisnavism.
First of all, detailed historical evidence of Vedic civilization is not that easy to come by, since the Vedic culture itself seems to have not valued the keeping of histories. In his book Traditional India, O. L. Chavarria-Aguilar writes of Indians: "A more unhistorical people would be difficult to find." Vedic civilization believed in recording the eternal and infinite. The ephemeral details of daily life (so much the concern of contemporary people) need not be recorded, since they had so little bearing on the larger, more significant goals of human life. Leisure time was to be used for self-realization, cultural pursuits, and worship of God–not rehashing current events or the past. Therefore, practically no histories, according to the Western concept of history, exist today about ancient India, because none were written.
Last edited by wig on 01 Nov 2010 22:38, edited 1 time in total.
Due to the nature of the thread start, this thread is incomplete without some liberal investigation on '2000+ years of continued Chinese nation' as well.
India:
The Mauryas encompassed nearly all of present day Indian territory as far back as 300-250BC
China:
NO dynasty accounted for the majority of Chinese territory until the Yuan dynasty in ~1270AD. And yes, the Yuan were the Mongol dynasty of Genghis Khan, who overran and sacked the previous dynasty. Subsequently, the Ming dynasty shrunk to much smaller than the land area of the Yuan dynasty. It was only the Qing (another external conqueror, the Manchus) dynasty in the mid 1600s, who extended territory to most of current Chinese boundaries.
In other words, there was not a single Chinese dynasty that encompassed all Chinese territory until ~1650AD, while there were multiple Indian dynasties encompassing most of Indian territory even before the generally recognized first unified dynasty of China - the one founded by Qin Shihuangdi. Even the greatest extent of Ashoka's empire (essentially *all* of India plus change) preceded the Qin dynasty.
One of the oft-repeated urban myths that sometimes pops-up in conversation even among many educated, well meaning Indians is that India as a nation is a British creation. The argument goes roughly as follows – India is an artificial entity. There are only a few periods in history when it was unified under the same political entity. It was only the British that created the idea of India as a single nation and unified it into a political state. A related assumption, in our minds, is that the developed Western countries have a comparatively far greater continuity of nationhood, and legitimacy as states, than India. This urban myth is not accidental. It was deliberately taught in the British established system of education. John Strachey, writing in `India: Its Administration and Progress' in 1888, said “This is the first and most essential thing to remember about India – that there is not and never was an India, possessing … any sort of unity, physical, political, social or religious; no Indian nation[1] .
To teach this self-serving colonial narrative obviously suited the British policy of divide and rule. That it still inanely survives means that it is worth setting to rest.
In this essay, we establish that Strachey's colonial narrative is demonstrably false. Not only is India a coherent nation but, in fact, there are few countries on the planet that are more legitimate nation-states than India. That some of us don't see this clearly only reflects how we have accepted the colonial myths as well as failed to study the history of the rest of the world.
Understanding Indian Nationhood
Geography
The first element of Indian nationhood draws from its unique geography. India is one of the few countries that can be located on a physical map of the world, even when no political boundaries are drawn. It is worth taking a deep breath and looking at the map below, reflecting on the significance of this geography before we go further.
Note that it would be a thousand years after the Mauryan Empire was established and even much after the Gupta Empire that the Anglo-Saxons in the 5th century AD would first move into the region that would later be called England. It would be nearly five hundred more years before the territory of England would be consolidated as an independent political entity. Only much later would there be attempts at unity of `Great Britain'. The `United Kingdom' that includes Scotland, Wales and Ireland, as we mentioned earlier, is only a recent political artifact.
So while the British were the last power, before the current state of India, to administratively consolidate its territory (as well as to divide it up as they left), they were by no means the first ones to do so.
Even when multiple kingdoms existed, these kingdoms were not like the countries of today with a passport and visa regime needed to cross and all kinds of regulations on movement of goods and people. A continued exchange of ideas, people, goods and scholarship took place throughout the sub-continent, largely unmindful of the boundaries of kingdoms.Furthermore, the territorial boundaries of India were largely maintained.
Thus there was an idea of India that made it be regarded as a separate and whole, even through political change and shifting boundaries of internal kingdoms.
The Idea of India
is the idea of India as a unit a new idea brought by the British or did it exist long before the British came? Did the people of this vast land recognize that they were linked together? Did they share a common story of their civilization, of their Indian-ness, their Bharatiyata? Remarkably, the idea of India, as Bharatavarsha or Aryavrata, appears to have been alive for thousands of years in our stories, thousands of years before there was an America or a Great Britain or a Mexico or France.
And yet, these stories are not taught to us in our schools in India. We learn instead, in our colonial schools, that the British created India and gave us a link language, as if we were not talking to each other for thousands of years, traveling, telling and retelling stories before the British came. How else did these ideas travel so rapidly through the landmass of India, and how did Shankracharya circumscribe India, debating, talking and setting up institutions all within his short lifespan of 32 years?
Whether these stories are actual or symbolic, represent real events or myths, it is clear from them that the idea of India existed in the minds of those that told these stories and those that listened. Together, all these stories wove and bound us together, along with migration, marriages and exchange of ideas into a culture unique in the story of mankind. A nation that was uniquely bound together in myriads of ways, yet not cast into a mono-conceptual homogeneity of language, worship, belief or practice by the diktat of a centralized church, intolerant of diversity.
And this unity as nation has been with us far before the idea of America existed. Far before the Franks had moved into northern France and the Visigoths into Spain, before the Christian Church was established and Islam was born. They have been there before Great Britain existed, before the Saxons had moved into Britannia. They have been there while empires have fallen, from when Rome was a tiny village to when it ruled an empire that rose and collapsed.
Thus the Arabs and Persians already had a conception of Hind far before the Mughal Empire was established. If we suggest that their conception of Hind was derived only from their contact with Sindh in western India, why would the British, when they landed in Bengal, form the East India Company, unless the conception of the land of India (a term derived from the original Hind) was shared by the natives and the British? They used this name much before they had managed to politically hold sway over much of India, and before they educated us that no India existed before their arrival. Why would the Portuguese celebrate the discovery of a sea-route to India when Vasco de Gama had landed in Calicut in the south, if India was a creation of the British Empire?
The answer is obvious. Because the conception of India, a civilization based in the Indian sub-continent, predates the rise and fall of these empires. True, that large parts of India were under unified political rule only during certain periods of time (though these several hundreds of years are still enormous by the scale of existence of most other countries throughout the globe) such as under the Mauryas or the Mughals. But those facts serve to hide rather than reveal the truth till we understand the history of the rest of the world and realize the historic social, political and religious unity of this land. We are not merely a country; we are a civilizational country, among very few other countries on the planet.
The only other continuous civilizations that come close to India as legitimate nations are nation-civilizations like Egypt, Iran and China. But Egypt, though old, having been assimilated in various empires and conquered first by Christianity and then by Islam, hardly retains much contact with its ancient traditions, languages or indigenous religion. Similarly Iran, the inheritor of the Persian empire which reached its peak in the 6th century BC, was assimilated into other empires and finally conquered by Islamic Arabs – it retains little of its Zoroastrian roots, though it retains its pre-Islamic language, albeit in Arab script. China is the other civilizational nation that can claim to have a legitimacy and continuity similar to India. However, for most of its history, Chinese civilization developed and concentrated in the Eastern plains. Consolidated rule, either political, social or religious/ideological over the entire vast area that present-day China occupies is relatively recent. Indian Buddhism obviously had a huge influence on China. Interestingly, despite communism and the Cultural Revolution, Chinese intellectuals have sought to link the roots of present day communist ideology with the teachings of Confucius.
todays chinese political boundaries is an aberration.
India is one of the few nations of the world with a continuity of civilization and an ancient conception of nationhood. In its religious, civilizational, cultural and linguistic continuity, it truly stands alone. This continuity was fostered by its unique geography and its resilient religious traditions. Unlike any other country on the planet, it retained these traditions despite both Islamic and Christian conquest, when most countries lost theirs and were completely converted when losing to even one of these crusading systems.
Yet Bharata stands. It stands in our stories, our languages, our pluralism and our unity. And as long as we remember these stories, keep our languages and worship the sacred land of our ancestors, Bharata will stand. It is only if we forget these truths that Bharata will cease to be. That is precisely why the British tried to hard to make us forget them.
some of the BRFites already know the above.
I would suggest some folks here to read the entire article. It is an excellent rebuttal to all who say India is a new country.
Several scholars put forth their perception and calculated derivations. Dr. S. Balakrishna (NASA, USA) proved the occurrence of 'two eclipses in (a span of) 13 days prior to Mahabharata'. Analysing the astronomical possibility of Vyasa's statement in Bhishma Parva "Amavasya occured on the 13th day. Two eclipses in a month, on the thirteenth day." he presented the data of eclipses during the period 3300 BCJ (Before the Calendar of Julian Ceaser) to 700 BCJ visible at Kuruxethra, using Lodestar Pro software. He stated the possibility of 672 eclipse pairs, ten 'thirteen day lunar first' eclipse pairs and concluded that 2559 BC eclipse pair was nearest to the text of Mahabharata.
Prof. R.N. Iyengar (I.I.Sc., Bangalore) systematically dealt with "Internal consistency of eclipses and planetary positions in Mahabharata". Verifying all double eclipses of 501-3000 B.C. and when Satur + Jupiter were near Vishaka, he concluded that 1478 B.C. was the most likely year of the war.
Dr. B.N. Narahari Achar (Dept. of Physics, University of Memphis, U.S.A.) gave a brief description of various available planetary software, a review of the works of astrophysicists Kochhar, Siddharth and astronomers, Sengupta and Srinivasa Raghavan and other astronomical references in the epic. He critically examined the limitations and the reliability of simulations and concluded that the astronomical events in the Mahabharata pointed to 3000 B.C.E. (Before Common Era)* and simulation of events to 3067 B.C.E., identical to the one given by Raghavan.
India has only existed for 60 years or so............
you are confusing between a nation and a state. modern India, the state, as in an unified political entity is 60 years old as you correctly mentioned. but the idea of India as a nation is far older than that. the term India itself is an exonym, much like Japan but India has been variously known as aryavarta, bharatvarsha etc to its people, even though they were usually living under different kings. another way to understand this is to understand how the various warring states conducted their warfare. unlike in inter-nation warfare, battles among Indian kingdoms were never fought people vs people, the commoners were not harmed even while the kings and their armies fought for supremacy.
any national identity crystallizes by defining itself wrt 'the other', the outsider. IOW, it is during contact with external cultures, especially hostile ones that national identity manifests itself (or not).
in India's case, you'll find this happening during the bactrian and kushan invasions (Alexander's invasion itself was a minor irritant and completely ignored in Indian literature) and repeated during the white hun invasion etc. this feeling of 'us, Indians' and 'them, outsiders' is evident from numerous texts of this period.
again, at numerous times in late ancient and early middle ages we have instances of almost all major Indian kingdoms, otherwise hostile, joining forces against external aggression from arab and turk forces.
lastly, if it is the existence of a political state that creates national identity by your theory, that happened for the first time about 2300 years ago, during the reign of the Mauryas, whose empire was larger than that of the Mughals and included modern day pakistan and Afghanistan. following them, more than one dynasty ruled empires spanning almost the whole sub-continent from the ancient age(Gupta, Pala, Pratihara etc) right up to the modern pre-british era (Mughal, Maratha).
what I find particularly amusing is the assertion that India was 'first unified under the British' (someone forgot to tell Emperor Asoka, poor fellow, 2300 years too early)
even if we discount the fact that the British left India with 500 independent kingdoms (some unification, that ! ) the stalwarts of the British 'India Office', those masters and champions of divide and rule would be turning in their graves to know that they had actually unified the country while trying to achieve the opposite in every conceivable way. isn't it much more likely that the national identity was already present and the presence of the British merely crystallized it (again, it's the outsider that acts as the catalyst ). in fact, if we go through the history of India's independence movement, 1857 onwards, it's quite easy to see that is true.
what intrigues me is why this argument 'India was not a country' is never applied to any other country although they have similar histories in this regard, I don't hear that Germany is not a country because it was unified in 1870 (or arguably even later, in 1990 !). I don't hear France is not a country because modern France is in existence only from 1945 and so on. In fact, similar arguments can be made about virtually any country, it just sounds silly to draw a particular conclusion about only one of those. I wonder what is the reason.
King Bharata, after whom the "Bharata varsha" is named, lived and reigned just before early forms of Jainism came into being. This information is in "Bhagavatam". According to it, Bharata was the son of Vrishaba (also the first Jain Thirthankara), the avatar of Vishnu.
Speaking in Cambridge in 1880, a high official of the British Raj named Sir John Strachey said that the "first and most essential thing to learn about India" is that "there is not, and there never was an India". Strachey thought it "conceivable that national sympathies may arise in particular Indian countries", but "that they should ever extend to India generally, that men of the Punjab, Bengal, the Northwestern Provinces, and Madras, should ever feel that they belong to one Indian nation, is impossible".
Strachey was merely the first in a long line of British commentators who thought that a united and independent political entity could never successfully be imposed on a land so differentiated by caste, religion, language and region. Winston Churchill, for example, predicted that after the British left the subcontinent, "India will fall back quite rapidly through the centuries into the barbarism and privations of the Middle Ages". He also thought it likely that "an army of white janissaries, officered if necessary from Germany, will be hired to secure the armed ascendancy of the Hindu".
This was an old post from previous version of strategic scenarios thread: (previous year):
Sir John Strachey in 1880, “This is the first and foremost thing to learn about India that there is not, and never was an India, or even any country of India possessing, according to European ideas, any sort of unity – physical, political, social and religious, no Indian nation, no ‘people of India’, of which we hear so much”. [Scholars like Sir John Seeley saw in Brahmanism the seed of Indian nationalism though (Expansion of England, London, 1882)].
Rajnarain Bose (1826-1899), Nabagopal Mitra, Bankim Chandra Chatterji (1838-1894) were the earliest "dissenters". MKG from SA, in 1909, wrote in “Hind Swaraj”: “The English have taught us that we were not a nation before and it will require centuries before we became one nation. This is without foundation. We were one nation before they came to India. One thought inspired us. Our mode of life was the same. It was because we were one nation that they were able to establish one kingdom.” (M. K. Gandhi-Hindu Dharma, Ahmedabad, 1950, p. 56).
The same year, young historian Radha Kumud Mookerji read a paper before the Dawn Society, Calcutta, presenting his "scientific" findings on the "Fundamental Unity of India". An expanded form of this essay was published from London in 1913. Bipin Chandra Pal wrote in 1912, in his monthly journal, ‘The Hindu Review’ under the title ‘Hindu Nationalism: What It Stands For’ followed by an other article ‘Nationalism and Politics’ in May 1913. His thesis was that European nationalism, being isolationist and materialist in nature was anti-humanity, while the Indian nationalism represented a higher stage of group consciousness and was a positive step towards human brotherhood and spirituality. In his own words, Hindu nationalism stood for – “God, Humanity and the Motherland” (B.C. Pal, Nationality and Empire, Calcutta, 1916. pp. 22-48 and pp. 73-112).
Sukumar Dutt wrote “A mind free from western conception of nationality is absolutely necessary to comprehend the problems of Indian Nationality” (p.18) because “it is difficult for a western mind to grasp the order of the ideas, unknown in European history, which has evolved this unique conception of the spiritual unity of India.” (Problems of Indian Nationality, Calcutta, 1926, p.17)
Lest the "nastikas" here, (those who do not believe in the existence of any "nation" of Indians in the past) throw all these into the "garbage heap" as "Hindu fundamentalists" living in their "dream world", there are people who cannot fit the bill of "Hindu revivalism" by any stretch of imagination holding similar views on nationalism.
Ramsay Muir, G.P. Gooch, MacDougall rejected the old definition based on five unities. MacDougall defined it as a ‘group consciousness’ (The Group Mind, London, 1920, p.100). G.P Gooch (Nationalism, London 1920) was more explicit, “The core of nationalism is group consciousness[....]. neither the occupation of a well defined area, nor community of race, language, religion, government or economic interests are indispensable to national self-consciousness” (p. 5-6). Ramsay Muir wrote “Nationality, then, is an elusive idea, difficult to define[….] Its essence is a sentiment”. (Nationalism and Internationalism, London, 1919).
Carlton J.H. Hayes concludes in his 'Nationalism: A religion' (New York, 1960): "In simplest terms nationalism may be defined as a fusion of patriotism with a consciousness of nationality" (p. 2) and that "A nationality receives its impress, its character, its individuality from cultural and historical forces" (p. 3). He further wrote, "historical tradition mean an accumulation of remembered or imagined experiences of the past" (p. 4). He defined patriotism 'as a peoples' territorial past, its ancestral soil, involving a popular, sentimental regard for a homeland where one's forefathers lived and are buried or cremated" (p. 4).
Rejecting the nineteenth Century belief that nationalism was a political phenomenon and the existence of State was a prerequisite in nation-formation, Hayes said, “If we are to grasp what a nationality is, we must avoid confusing it with state or nation” (p. 6). Accepting the idea of cultural nationalism, Hayes wrote, “Cultural nationalism may exist with or without political nationalism. For, nationalities can do and exist for fairly long periods without political unity and independence.” (ibid)
Hans Kohn, concludes that the nature of the processes of nation formation in Europe and Asia was not the same. In Europe ‘state’ was mainly instrumental in nation formation, while in Asia nationalism had cultural origins. Even political unity of Germany and Italy was preceded by vigorous intellectual and cultural movements led by Herder, Goethe and Kant. Mazzini. Regarding patriotism, Hayes writes, “Loyalty to familiar places is relatively natural, but it requires artificial effort-purposeful conscious education and training to render men loyal to the sum total of places unfamiliar as well as familiar in an entire country inhabited by his nationality” (p. 9). That means that the spirit of patriotism and national consciousness does not permeate all sections of the population in the same degree at a given point of time. To quote Hayes again, "only through an intensive and extensive educational process will a local group of people become thoroughly aware of their entire nationality and supremely loyal to it" (p. 10).
Every Purana text contains a section called Bhuvan Kosh, in which the boundaries of the land called Bharatavarsha are clearly defined and its progeny is given a common name Bharati. A list of all the Janapadas scattered all over the country is given along with the lists of rivers and mountains. A smaller list of seven holy rivers, mountains and cities symbolizing the unity of the land are given there. These slokas were meant for daily recital. List of "punyasthan" or tirthas are explicitly given in the Puranas as well as Mahabharata. These pilgrim centers cover the whole land.
This devotion to the land is not confined to its physical or material aspect only. Vishnu Purana states that the gods in heaven also feel envious of those who are born in the land of Bharatavarsha because the gods after the expiry of their merits will have to take rebirth on the earth while those born in Bharata will be able to transcend the cycle of rebirth. Chapter 9 of the Bhishmaparva in Mahabharata describes Bharatavarsha. While singing the greatness of Bharatavarsha the narrator gives a long list of ancient kings who loved this land - combining the very modern elements of "patriotism, love of the land".
Thus, we find that all the ingredients of the group consciousness called nationalism are present here. This consciousness of the geographical unity exists in the Samkalpa mantra meant to be part of daily prayers and was recited at the beginning of every sacred act or ritual. Dr. Radha Kumud Mukhkerji goes to the extent “India was preaching the gospel of nationalism when Europe was passing through what has been aptly called the Dark Age of her history, and was labouring under the travails of a new birth". (Nationalism in Hindu Culture, London 1921, 2nd Edition 1957, p. 47)
Asokan inscriptions use a common dialect and script with minor regional variations addressed to the "commons". They use the term Jambudvipa. Samkalpa mantra treats Bharat Khande or Varsh as a part of Jambudvipa. Kautilya Arthashastra of 4th Century B.C. while defining the territory to be conquered by a Chakravarti King defines it as the land between the Himalayas and the ocean from north to south and eight thousand miles from east to west. (Book 9, Chapter 1, Prakarana 135-136 -R.D.Shyamasastry). Dr. R.K. Mookerji believes that the conception of a single power dominating the whole country had not originated with Chandragupta Maurya or Kautilya rather it must have been much older then Chandragupta, Aitreya Brahmana (VIII 15) also presents the same ideal, i.e. there should be one ruler of this Prithvi upto the seas.
In both the above references the word Prithvi has been used as the name of the country. In Mahagovindsutta of Digha Nikaya (considered the oldest portion of Tripitakakas) "Maha Prithvi" name has been given to the land whose shape has been compared with that of a bullock cart which happens to be rectangular in the north and conical in the south. (Rahul Sankrityayana in Hindi had identified this with Bharat). Obviously, the word Prithvi could not have been used for the whole earth beyond Bharatavarsha.
The Prithvi Sukta of Atharva Veda (XII.I) uses the common word Bhoomi for land, but uses Prithvi for that particular territory which was later called Jambudivpa or Bharatavarsha. Here, Prithvi is clearly identified with the Vedic history and culture. This Sukta says that this is the land where our ancestors displayed their valour, where gods defeated the Asuras; where our gods Ashwinis, Vishnu and Indra, the husband of Shachi performed their divine feats; it is the land where sacrifices are performed, for them altars are established, where our sacrificial posts stand erect where five classes of men (four varnas and fifth the Nisad) live; this land which is sustained by Dharma where we are protected by god Indra himself; where we offer ghee to the agni, who acts as our messenger to the gods. It is land where men offer their oblations to the gods in sacrifices and relish the remains of the sacrificial offerings. Here Indra destroys the enemies of gods - Asuras and the demon Vrtra. This is the land where pillars (Yupas) are erected for the Sacrifices and where the Rishis chant the mantras of Rigveda Samaveda and Yajurveda, where Indra is offered Somarasa. The land, where ancient Rishis sang divine songs, where they performed seven sattras with Yajnas and Tapas. This is the land where men move in their chariots and bullock carts on the roads where Sabhas and Samitis function in the villages.
Although the Prithvi Sukta does not give exact boundaries of the land, but the mention of Himalayas, Sea and Sindhu, the six seasons, the flora and fauna, agriculture and crafts all point to the land "Bharatavarsha". Prithvi Sukta uses the word "bhoomi" to denote 'land' while the word Prithvi denotes its name. Please read it in Sanskrit to get a feel of the emotion expressed for all the living and non-living attributes of this "land". It repeatedly reminds that this "motherland" sustains, feeds and gives refuge even after death. Therefore, this land is our mother and "we are her sons" (12th stanza), because it feeds us just like a "mother" (10-th stanza). Prithvi Sukta acknowledges different dialects and different norms of behaviour according to their own regions, but this motherland just like a "cow", "feeds them all with her milk without any distinction" (45-th stanza).
The opening verse of the Prithvi Sukta mentions those values and ideals which sustain this land called Prithvi : Truth, Cosmic Law, Initiation, Penance, Veda and Sacrifice. The name Prithvi, itself could have originated from king Prithu (supposed to have started agriculture on the land) indicating a conscious connection of civilization and culture.
Was there a concept of early geographical core? Manu Smriti gives four increasing spheres of influence. As the core, Manu Smriti (II. 18-19) states that the land between the divine rivers Saraswati and Drishadvati was created by the gods themselves and was known by the name Brahmavarta. In this land the code of conduct transmitted by the tradition in regular succession from generation to generation was seen as the noble code of conduct for all varnas".
At the next stage of expansion, Manusmriti mentions (II. 20-21) the name of Brahmarshi Desh which included the Janapadas of Matsya, Kurukshetra, Panchala and Shurasena. Manusmriti declares that the people born in this land were the torch bearers in the realm of human conduct and therefore all the inhabitants of Prithvi should learn the lessons in character and conduct from them (Manu II. 20-21).
The next expansion is named Madhyadesa in Manusmriti (II. 22), covering the land between Himalaya and Vindhya mountains from north to south and to the west of Prayag in the east and to the east of Vinsana in the west, (the place where river Saraswati is believed to have disappeared).
The fourth and the last stage mentioned by Manu Smriti was called Aryavarta, i.e. the land of the Aryas. It was spread from eastern sea to the western sea and from Himalaya Mountain in the north upto river Narmada in the south. This pure land is worthy of performing sacrifices (yajna) and the black antelope, the symbol of sacrifice, could roam there freely. The lands beyond Aryavarta are impure, i.e. not yet part of the cultural stream. (Manu II. 22-23).
The etymology of the word Arya also includes the meaning 'agriculture' as well as its use as a qualitative connotation denoting 'noble, respectable, higher' in the whole of Sanskrit and Prakrit Literature. Rigvedic "Aryanise the whole World", can mean a civilizational process leading to the spread of a higher culture. It is in this sense that the word Arya has been used in the earliest Buddhist and Jain tradition. The story of Mathav Videgh following the march of Sacrificial fire from the bank of the river Saraswati to the banks of the river Sadanira (Satapath Brahman) also proves that it was a cultural process and not a racial one.
MKG in Hind Swaraj (1909). "Our leading men traveled throughout India either on foot or in bullock-carts………. what do you think could have been the intention of those farseeing ancestors of ours who established Setuabandh (Rameshwar) in the south, Jagannath in the East and Hardwar in the North as places of pilgrimage? You will admit they were no fools. They knew that worship of God could have been performed just as well at home. They taught us that those whose hearts were aglow with righteousness had the Ganga in their own homes....But they saw that India was one undivided land so made by nature. They, therefore, argued that it must be one nation. Arguing thus, they established holy places in various parts of India, and fired the people with idea of nationality in a manner unknown in other parts of the world". (M.K. Gandhi. Hind Swaraj, Chap. 9, Hindu Dharma, Ahmedabad 1950, p. 56).
Now where should I throw all these men away? Into the garbage heap of history for those Indians who dare to challenge the claim of non-existence of the Bharatyia "nation"? MKG too?
1. Geographically, India refers to the region of Indian Subcontinent and enclosed between Hindukush, Himalayas and Arakanese mountains OR perhaps Burmese forests.
2. However, there are certain regions which lie beyond this geographical barrier and yet are linked with India irrevocably. These regions are Southern Afghanistan (lands to the south of Oxus), Myanmar, Tibet, Sri Lanka. Thus, Indian subcontinent along with these peripheral regions comprise of "India" owing to cultural unity and continuity of this region with subcontinent in historical times.
3. The people who were following the native socio-political and religious systems in the aforementioned region were categorised as "Hindus" OR "Indians" by the outsiders. Thus the identity of Indian Or Hindu was first required when the native people of the regions mentioned above encountered with people outside. Mind you, everybody in the world, except Indians, identify India and Indians based on River Sindhu. The typical reference for this land by natives of this land is "Bhaarat".
4. This land is unified politically in its entirety for more than 50 years with stable governance twice in the course of history - Maurya Empire and British Raj, thus fulfilling the criteria for later European concept of "Nation-state". There were additional lands in both the cases which are not limited to subcontinent and aforementioned peripheral regions.
5. Thus, Indian history refers to history of events and people from the region mentioned in paragraph 2.
The maximum expanse of Indian Sanskriti in space and time is the maximum expanse of India as a Rashtra.
Who is Indian (Historically)?
Concepts like religion and nation-state were not the basis of world-view of Hindus (Indics). All those who followed socio-religious ideologies native to India were Indians by default. People born in India following foreign ideologies are Indian if they adopted local culture and did not declare themselves to be non-Indians.
There is one idea that is very difficult for westerners and especially Chinese to understand - India became a moral concept before it became a physical concept. Also, India (or Bharat-varsha, to tak the proper name) was never conceived as an ethnic construct (European concept of nation state), or as an administrative construct (Chinese construct of an empire).
Indian nationhood was always understood to be the expression of a moral order (Dharma). Whereas, by contrast, European nationhood was an expression of ethnic exclusivity, and Chinese state an expression of force and administrative control.
You must understand the spiritual difference between Indian nationhood and Euro/Chinese nationhood. Indian nationhood is state of conciousnes, and the external paraphrenelia is constructed to support it. Whereas the other ones first create the external support, and then find the reason to justify it. Hence, Euro/Chinese nationhood are imaginary constructs, whereas Indian nationhood, being based on moral law, is not a construct, but a reality.
European philosophy is amoral, that is, it is utilitarian. Their commentators look at India and see that there is no utilitarianism in our principles, but an idealism, and that idelaism is spiritual, not materialistic. (This is the reason that the likes of Kissinger say that Hinduism is 'superstitious'. Kissinger would be the one to say, he is the ultimate amoral diplomat.)
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To the people who say that China and Europe have had a long period of central rule:
1. Chinese nationhood is based on Han ethnicity and is geographically limited by the Great Wall. All other parts of current Chinese state (Tibet and Xinkiang) are NOT PART OF CHINESE NATION.
2. European Union, is an artificial bureaucratic construct, just like the old Chinese empires. It is not based in history. And it will soon die a natural death as the present economic crisis reaches its logical conclusion. Then during the ensuing European civil war, we will ask the question whether Europe is a valid construct.
Atri wrote:4. This land is unified politically in its entirety for more than 50 years with stable governance twice in the course of history - Maurya Empire and British Raj, thus fulfilling the criteria for later European concept of "Nation-state". There were additional lands in both the cases which are not limited to subcontinent and aforementioned peripheral regions.
it is this kind of statements that prompted me to start this thread.
Atri sahab, are these the only two examples of pan-Indian political units ?
Atri wrote:4. This land is unified politically in its entirety for more than 50 years with stable governance twice in the course of history - Maurya Empire and British Raj, thus fulfilling the criteria for later European concept of "Nation-state". There were additional lands in both the cases which are not limited to subcontinent and aforementioned peripheral regions.
it is this kind of statements that prompted me to start this thread.
Atri sahab, are these the only two examples of pan-Indian political units ?
I would like to be corrected RahulM ji, but which other powers conquered entire Indian Subcontinent and ruled it peacefully for at least more than 50 years?
Mughal: The domain of stable mughal rule does not include Gondwan and Region to the south of Narmada/Tapti, in other words empire of Akbar. All their efforts to expand southwards and east wards were continuously contested. Whilst Aurangzeb managed to defeat Deccan sultanates, he could not defeat Marathas. While he was crossing Tungabhadra and Kaveri, Marathas had already crossed Narmada Northwards and were literally controlling Malwa and Gujarat. Mughals (thankfully) did not get chance to run their writ as a "stable power" over entire Indian subcontinent.
Maratha: These have been my personal favourites. There were in power for 170 years and out of those 170, 100 years were dealing with 3/4th of Indian subcontinent. They tried to win Bengal but after 10 years of bloodshed and loot, settled with Orissa. They liberated Punjab and conquered Attock and Peshwar and kept the region from Khyber to Attock across Sindhu free of Pathan rulers for 18 months. But then they withdrew. They did not "cleanse" the heart-land "Ganga-Valley". They did not cleanse Nizam of HYD, nor Hyder ali of Karnataka. They did not venture into Sindh.
The thing worth noting is modern partitioned "republic of India" is roughly the same region in Punjab and Bengal which was thoroughly raided and cleansed of Mullah influence by Marathas. Roughly that same region has somehow managed to stay in India. But like most of "central powers" of India, they too captured 3/4th of region. One might agree that Bengal, Hyderabad, Oudh, Rohilkhand, Mughal (red-fort, delhi), Hyder ali gave them Chauth and were hence vassal states but the terms of payment were not honoured by these guys leading to periodic quarrels. Nor did they come to their aid while they required help (Panipat), in fact they did not even remain neutral (Shuja, Najib helping Abdali). So how can we say that they politically controlled entire Indian subcontinent and ran their writ and established their system?
Gupta: They are interesting. Raghuvamsha describes conquest of Chandra-2 in Bengal, Deep south, Western ghats, Deserts of rajasthan, Sindh, Kandahar, trans-oxania. However there was significant chunk of "Vakatakas" which needs to be dealt with. Yes, most of the historians agree that Vakatakas were friendly vassals of Guptas and that there was plenty of "marital exchanges" between guptas and Vakatakas, particularly the regimes of Chandra-2 Vikramaditya and Kumaragupta. Combining this factor, yes, Vakataka-Guptas ruled entire region (subcontinent) and central asia too (dream of Aurangzeb and British). There is urgent need to create this map and uploaded on Wiki.
I am categorically speaking of conquering entire subcontinent and establishing a stable system for at least 50 years. This how one can create a Nation and National-Character. And as far as I know, apart from Maurya and British and (Vakataka-Guptas), no-one did that.
The point of emphasis is, trying to define India in terms of western system of "nation-state" is futile because a geopolitical entity with "inviolable boundaries" is a ridiculous concept in Indian context. The Indian system of "Dikvijaya" does not necessitate elimination of reigning dynasties while performing the conquest. There is no concept like Gupta-citizen and Vakataka citizen and both of them requiring passports to travel. Irrespective of anyone ruling, all were referred to themselves as "Bhaaratiyas". This "Bhaarat" was there when there were 1000 princely states in India and this same "Bhaarat" was present when there was Maurya OR british regime.
I will be dealing with this in deracination thread shortly. The glue which defines and keeps India together is "Sanskriti". India is a "Sanskritik-state" essentially. Sanskritik-state can be vaguely translated to a "federal structure of Hindu-power-centres". There may be other models which might have worked OR which might work as well in future, but the key word is "Hindu (Indic) power centres".
Nothing so complicated as that Atri-ji, we can simply say, did there exist a central authority, which in terms of tribute paying regions hold over 2/3 of Indian subcontinent at 50 years at stretch?
We dont have to get into either civilization status and/or complete owenership.
On that basis Mughals qualify, as do Maratha's in my view, Satvahanas, nearly ALL Maghad/Vanga dynasties do, so does Kanishka et al.
If consolidation of 2/3 of Indian subcontinent is considered as "sufficient" for calling India a "nation" in western sense, then there are many many more dynasties, Sankuji.. For that, I have a theory of "central state" with others playing subsidiary role. Typically, for all practical purposes, "what is good for central state, is good for india as whole" although this is not universally true.
Categorisation of political treason
When speaking in historical context, treachery/betrayal/treason amounts to political backstabbing. Now, in his space and time, Jaichandra was simply following Chanakya's principle that enemy's enemy is one's friend. For some reason, however trivial it may be, after his daughter eloped with Prithviraja, Jayachandra was practically an enemy of Prithviraja.
Transcending the barriers of space-time, it is seen that this act of Jaichandra proved to be disastrous for entire Indic civilization. Jayachandra failed to understand Islam and the costs associated with inviting a dangerous foreign entity to settle trivial internal disputes.
However, in Jayachandra's defence, one can say that the concept of religion was alien to Bhaarat then. Jayachandra could have assumed that all this will remain strictly business and nothing personal and religious. However, it can be argued that, Mehmood of Gazni had invaded Bhaarat 180 years ago. Jayachandra should have remembered what Mahmood did with Somnath. And he should have remembered how his ancestors forged an alliance of 17 Rajput kings and massacred Masood Gazni and his army of 150,000 men in 1033 at Battle of Bahraich. As a king he should have remembered the history of his own kin.
This led to categorizing the interactions of small kings with respect to central dominant power of the region.
1. if small king asks for help of some dominant power to defeat another small king, it can't be called as treachery of King A towards King B. If the big power happens to be indigenous and/or considers itself as indigenous, then it is not at all a treachery. In fact, political unification helps the stabilization of civilization if the central power is just and considers itself indigenous.
2. Inviting a dominant foreign power to defeat another small king is treachery of King A towards entire nation/civilization.
3. Inviting a dominant foreign power to defeat indigenous dominant central power is a treachery towards central power and nation/civilization as well.
Jaichandra's behaviour falls in category 2. This is because, history is not just facts. The way ordinary people choose to remember their own past is also very important facet of history, which marxist historians choose to ignore.
In his space-time, Jayachandra was, according to him and circumstancial evidence, in category 1 and not a traitor. However, looking beyond space-time barrier, it seems that Jayachandra was myopic, foolish, and unintentionally treacherous towards Bhaarat and not towards Prithviraja.
I am talking about those who controlled the entire region. We do use this central-state concept when we refer to Mughal-India, Maratha-India, Rashtrakuta-India etc. But what of remaining 33%? Should they not be taken in the idea? And if they can be taken in willingly, why do it by force?
Oh no, Atri-ji you get me slightly wrong; I am not saying that 33% need to be forgotten or anything like that (but some times force may be needed, for example we may need force today to go beyond the 2/3rd India is stuck in) merely saying that if the current India is considered a nation by some metrics, we can easily extend those metrics to many times in past.
We set up much higher goals than that are needed to qualify for the western concepts of nation-state and other such ideas and castigate ourselves for not getting there.
While that stream is very Indian and certainly welcome, all I am saying is that we need to underscore that we are worried about those goals because the western set goals are already easily achieved.
So I am not disagreeing with you, merely filling in blanks where you left them while pushing the envelop.
Agreed with last post.. I am trying to remove the "macaulay's glasses" too hard in order to grasp the real India which existed prior to British and Muslims.. "Nation-state" has become indispensable evil in today's world. Peace..
Atri ji, my thoughts are similar to Sanku ji in this case. a central authority that controlled a major part of the country is enough for our purposes, no further qualifiers are necessary. few modern nation state would satisfy the requirements you have imposed on them, viz. 3/4 of territory and min 50 years rule.
in addition to the dynasties mentioned others that can claim to a central authority are the pratiharas, palas etc. even when there was not one central authority, large swathes of the country was controlled by two or three major powers, who battled among themselves but didn't harm the common people which is another evidence of the fact that the people were considered as one.
the term India itself is an exonym, much like Japan but India has been variously known as aryavarta, bharatvarsha etc to its people, even though they were usually living under different kings. another way to understand this is to understand how the various warring states conducted their warfare. unlike in inter-nation warfare, battles among Indian kingdoms were never fought people vs people, the commoners were not harmed even while the kings and their armies fought for supremacy.
any national identity crystallizes by defining itself wrt 'the other', the outsider. IOW, it is during contact with external cultures, especially hostile ones that national identity manifests itself (or not).
in India's case, you'll find this happening during the bactrian and kushan invasions (Alexander's invasion itself was a minor irritant and completely ignored in Indian literature) and repeated during the white hun invasion etc. this feeling of 'us, Indians' and 'them, outsiders' is evident from numerous texts of this period.
again, at numerous times in late ancient and early middle ages we have instances of almost all major Indian kingdoms, otherwise hostile, joining forces against external aggression from arab and turk forces.
Another important aspect regarding the idea of India comes from a Sanskrit play called "Mudrarakshasa" written by Vishakadutta. This play deals with fall of the Nandas and the emergence of Chandragupta Maurya. Historians still whether the work is completely historical or has some fiction in it.
According to the play, during the invasion of Alexander (refered to as "Alakshendra the Yavan prince" in the book), Chanakya asked the Nandas, Pururava (Porus), ruler Takshapura (Taxila) and other rulers of India to join forces against Alexander to defend Bhaarata. And the play also mentions Chanakya being distraught with the ruler of Taxila for joining the forces of the enemy.
Such works of literature are another good source to learn about the political situation is those periods.
What makes India a nation aka what defines a nation ?
A nation is a group of people who share culture, ethnicity and language. {source wiki}
Was India always a nation by that definition or is it a recent phenomenon ?
By that definition it has always been a nation. It is not recent.
How does this nationhood compare to other 'nations' ?
From a modern nation-state concept, it can be considered to be made of heterogeneous people living in a State. Heterogeneous or homogeneous depends on how one slices and dices the population. The population in America is more homogeneous than in India. The population in former USSR would be highly heterogeneous because of the way the Union was put together.
The desert on the West, the Himalayas on the North & East, and the surrounding oceans have aided the region to consider itself different from the rest of the human population. But that did not refrain from Indians influencing others or being influenced by others. Just that the geography bound the Kingdoms - it is like forcing married siblings to live in a big joint family. A big mumbling and bumbling cohesive unit.
Apart from the basic physical needs (food, water, shelter, security) that bring people together, there are metaphysical aspects that bind people. Spirituality and philosophies are two important areas in the metaphysical sphere. Dharma was another key factor. The concept of Dharma is as important as the concept of zero. Dharma is a gift to humankind from India, like no other.
India simply is and Indians simply are. The explanations of what India is and Indians are, is more likely to reflect on the person explaining than what India or Indians are.
Personally, I have always felt at home wherever I went to in India. TN, Kerala, AP, Bihar, Bengal, Guj, Maharashtra, Orissa, MP. I have traveled and stayed extensively in these states and never felt I was in a different country despite the differences in language, cuisine, culture, gods prayed to, dress etc etc etc. Heck, I felt right at home in Nepal too.
If you stop the manufactured animosity and allow relations to normalize, within a generation or two even Pak and BD will feel right at home for me.
Great thread. I do come across many Chinese netizens who often think that there wasn't any India and its only a handover from British Raj. Its possible that it may be an outcome of CCP's propaganda: to show India, historically understood in China as the home of Buddhism and land of saints (think "Journey to the West"), to just a remnant of British Empire trying to grab more land. Then, it becomes much more easier to manipulate Chini abduls to make imaginary ghosts and to justify preemptive strikes against India. Another logic is, its a careful attempt to delete China's own Buddhist past by denying India's past.
Agree with Shiv. Just because some weirdos ask a stupid question does not require us to start jumping through hoops to "prove" anything. If the questioner is deluded, let him remain so.
) but let's first compose our thoughts on India's nationhood. points about other countries can always be added as a rejoinder.
