(Source: Book Review, The Hindu, 10 June 2008)
Transition to modernity
An interpretation of the historical process in India’s evolution into a modern nation
by K.N.Panikkar
VISHNU’S CROWDED TEMPLE — India Since the Great Rebellion: Maria Misra; Allen Lane-Penguin, 11, Community Centre, Panchsheel Park, New Delhi-110017. £ 6.99.
The historical process through which India evolved into a modern nation is the theme of this book. In the words of the author it is conceived as a “three act drama.” The first narrates the building of the empire and the “diverse and complex response of Indians to this curious edifice”; the second is concerned with the crisis of the imperial system and the successful struggle of the national movement, and the third narrates the post-Independence project of democratic and secular reconstruction, and the subsequent Hindu “nationalist” departure.
The author identifies the principle dynamics of this process as “the enduring tension between hierarchy and equality, between difference and commonality and between the conflicting views of how to integrate and ‘modernise’ India.” The distinct character of Indian modernity is a result of this dynamics which encouraged the coexistence of the ideas of formal equality and democracy with notions of hierarchy and difference. According to the author, the existing historiographies — liberal, Marxist and subaltern — have not been able to capture the essence of this dynamics. They have either romanticised it as “triumphant westernisation” or reduced it to “a struggle between all powerful elites and the hopelessly subordinated poor” or gave undue emphasis to “cultural rupture between the mass of Indians and their leaders.” The alternative proposed in the book, not being theoretically well grounded, does not meet the claim of explaining the “complex and halting evolution” of India “into a very particular kind of modern nation.”
Modernisation
The book is understandably not intended to be empirically exhaustive. But what is likely to baffle the reader is the basis of the selection of information which does not fall into a satisfactory scheme. The first “Act” on colonialism, for instance, opens with the British attempt to make loyalty the cornerstone of their policy, then devotes some space to the issue of modernisation and then to the caste and communal divide. They do not gel together to give an impression of what colonialism meant for Indians. In the bargain the central fact of colonialism, impoverisation of India, escapes attention. The author indeed points out the colonial interest implicit in the modernising measures like the construction of railways and canals. The railways made India easier to secure and at the same time helped to link the commercially prosperous areas of farming to the cities and ports from where commodities could be exported. The canals served to enrich the recruiting grounds and to ensure placid sepoys.
The author makes an interesting point about how the railways helped the increase in pilgrimage. After the construction of railways the number of pilgrims to Gaya, Benares and Puri had increased manifold and the numbers attending festivals such as the rath yatra at Jagannath temple had soared. “The coffers of the Brahmans and other religious professionals were not emptied by the iron progress of rationality and railways, but filled to overflowing.” The surge of religiosity in contemporary India, aided by communication revolution, can be read as a sequel to it.
Culture and politics
The Indian response to colonial presence and the post-Independence efforts at national reconstruction form the major part of the book. The author demonstrates how cultural concerns coalesced with politics through self-strengthening movements like the Ramakrishna Mission, the Arya Samaj and the agitations around cow protection, and the Age of Consent Bill. The importance accorded to the cultural issue is refreshing, particularly the emphasis on the cultural dimension of the Gandhian strategy. “It was through changing what people ate, how they dressed, their attitude to sex and religion that he proposed to emancipate India from self- imposed colonisation.” In other words, by foregrounding a cultural ideal different from what the “modernising” colonial rule had imbibed in the mind of the middle class. The discussion on post-colonial India is mainly centred on Nehru, the Emergency and Hindutva. A close associate of Nehru had once remarked that he was the sum of three rather conflicting influences: British liberalism, Russian Marxism and Gandhianism. By the end of his life he was not able to fully hold on to any of them and became a prisoner of political pragmatism, except in the case of a multi-cultural approach to national identity. But Nehru’s greatest contribution was the institutionalisation of democracy which was to a large measure responsible for the defeat of the Emergency. The author rightly suggests that the uncongenial climate created by the Emergency, combined with the Hinduism crafted for the modern age by the Vishwa Hindu Parishad had led to the rise of the Sangh Parivar.
Critique
That the references are not given in the body of the text, although there is an exhaustive bibliography of secondary sources on which this work is based, inhibits an engaged reading. The citations are referred to in the bibliography which is rather cumbersome to locate. The professional historian who would like to check the sources may not find this method very welcome. Nevertheless, it may not deter the general reader to whom this book may be of greater appeal. To both, however, the factual errors, which are not infrequent, are bound to be an irritant. In fact, there is an error in the opening sentence itself.
Finally, the metaphor of the temple in the title and analysis may suggest that the book is a Hindu view of Indian history, which it is not. In fact, the author is critical of the Sangh Parivar and the type of history it had foregrounded while in power. Her assessment of Rashtriya Swayam Sevak Sangh is that “it is xenophobic, hierarchical, bellicose and reactionary.” The temple metaphor goes against the grain of the book.
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