Book review- India that is Bharat by Shri J Sai Deepak (Bharat Trilogy #1)
“Bharat as a civilisation was a reality, and reducing that reality and near-unbroken lived experience to a mere talking point to score brownie points over one another was more proof of expediency than real conviction in the values the Indic civilisation stood for.”
During class 9th, the history lessons taught me that the Mughals, Afghans, and, lastly, the Britishers who invaded India had pronounced and positive effects on our overall development and progress. My little brain tried to mug it up, but the heart thought, “were we that backwards!!”.
The reason for this heart-thinking was my mother. My mother, who is a core vedic follower and a Sanskrit philosopher, on the one hand, wanted me to learn all the historical “bookish” facts due to academic reasons. Still, on the other hand, she was the one who told me “real” facts about “gold-bird: India”. She introduced me to the lives and works of Shri Raja Ram Mohan Roy, Shri Bal Gangadhar Tilak, and other patriotic personalities. Several tales of India’s glorious past and rich culture were presented as stories and, at times, through long lectures!!!
Somehow, my childhood self managed to develop the sense that we are being fooled through the contents of the academic history book, making us perceive our country on standard terms. (P.S.- I am sure of one thing, i.e. my mother is overly emotional about India.)
Well, whatever the reason, whenever I get a chance to learn more about India’s past and culture, I try to know that.
“India That is Bharat” is a rigorous survey of India’s political history since the Papal Bull of 1493. It presents various subjects related to the Indic civilisational history and its immediate anxieties about India. The book strongly argues that while the colonisation of the Indian landscape may have been reversed post-independence, the minds continue to be possessed and ultimately handicapped by a historical narrative that the outsider set for us.
The book has three sections – Coloniality, Civilisation, and Constitution. The grave details, exposure to several historical mistakes in collecting information, exposition of European hypocrisy and many other things in the first section …are my favourite part of the book.
He presents many historical myths that the European historians and those inspired by them, like the Marxist ideology created about Indians. From the Aryan race theory to the ‘tribes’ of Jharkhand, the concept of ‘castes’ to the pressing need to spread the Gospel, the author has exposed these hidden secrets that forcefully cancel many mythical ideas embedded in Indian history hitherto.
Further, this work traces the origins of seemingly universal constructs such as 'toleration', 'secularism' and 'humanism' to Christian political theology. Their subsequent role in subverting the indigenous Indic consciousness through a secularised and universalised Reformation, constitutionalism, is examined.
India, that is, Bharat, does not just crib and complain; it charts a path for the restoration of our subjectivity and cultural and civilisational agency. It does so with its simple yet powerful message – ‘that colonialism and coloniality were expressions of an ideology and worldview informed by Christianity and the legal and constitutional discourse of a postcolonial, non-Western state form such as India are still coloured by it’.
The book is an eye-opener—a definite recommendation to the one seeking interesting answers related to India, that is, Bharat.
The reason for this heart-thinking was my mother. My mother, who is a core vedic follower and a Sanskrit philosopher, on the one hand, wanted me to learn all the historical “bookish” facts due to academic reasons. Still, on the other hand, she was the one who told me “real” facts about “gold-bird: India”. She introduced me to the lives and works of Shri Raja Ram Mohan Roy, Shri Bal Gangadhar Tilak, and other patriotic personalities. Several tales of India’s glorious past and rich culture were presented as stories and, at times, through long lectures!!!
Somehow, my childhood self managed to develop the sense that we are being fooled through the contents of the academic history book, making us perceive our country on standard terms. (P.S.- I am sure of one thing, i.e. my mother is overly emotional about India.)
Well, whatever the reason, whenever I get a chance to learn more about India’s past and culture, I try to know that.
“India That is Bharat” is a rigorous survey of India’s political history since the Papal Bull of 1493. It presents various subjects related to the Indic civilisational history and its immediate anxieties about India. The book strongly argues that while the colonisation of the Indian landscape may have been reversed post-independence, the minds continue to be possessed and ultimately handicapped by a historical narrative that the outsider set for us.
The book has three sections – Coloniality, Civilisation, and Constitution. The grave details, exposure to several historical mistakes in collecting information, exposition of European hypocrisy and many other things in the first section …are my favourite part of the book.
He presents many historical myths that the European historians and those inspired by them, like the Marxist ideology created about Indians. From the Aryan race theory to the ‘tribes’ of Jharkhand, the concept of ‘castes’ to the pressing need to spread the Gospel, the author has exposed these hidden secrets that forcefully cancel many mythical ideas embedded in Indian history hitherto.
Further, this work traces the origins of seemingly universal constructs such as 'toleration', 'secularism' and 'humanism' to Christian political theology. Their subsequent role in subverting the indigenous Indic consciousness through a secularised and universalised Reformation, constitutionalism, is examined.
India, that is, Bharat, does not just crib and complain; it charts a path for the restoration of our subjectivity and cultural and civilisational agency. It does so with its simple yet powerful message – ‘that colonialism and coloniality were expressions of an ideology and worldview informed by Christianity and the legal and constitutional discourse of a postcolonial, non-Western state form such as India are still coloured by it’.
The book is an eye-opener—a definite recommendation to the one seeking interesting answers related to India, that is, Bharat.
A lucid summation of a pertinent thought. The blogger reviews the book wonderfully well making the reader inquisitive to oneself plunge in to the pages of the book
ReplyDeleteThank you sir for the appreciative words. Keep checking the blog for new posts
Delete