The last day in Gandhiji’s life – 30th January, 1948

Bapu attained martyrdom this very day – 68 years ago.

Let us for a while go back to the day, 30^th January, 1948. History testifies to the fact that till the moment he was assassinated in cold blood which led to a time freeze and cast its shadow of gloom all across the world, it was like any other day for Gandhiji at his temporary residence in New Delhi – the then Birla House, now re-christened Gandhi Smriti – that stands on Tees January Marg, named in the poignant memory of his martyrdom.

Gandhiji awoke at 3:30 am and as per daily routine, did his prayers and worked on his desk for three hours before going back for a short nap. He got up again at 8:00 am and had his first nourishment in the form of goat’s milk, raw vegetables, oranges and a concoction of ginger and sour limes, a repast he would repeat in the evening. Then followed another nap before he was up at 2:00 pm when select visitors were allowed right up to the open space behind the Birla House to meet with him. When free of these engagements Gandhiji would be at the spinning wheel. This had been his routine ever since he had arrived in Delhi to restore communal amity.

At 4:00 pm arrived Patel with whom Gandhiji had decided to have a serious talk on how best to have a truck with Nehru. The post of Deputy Prime Minister did not sit easy on Patel’s shoulders. The presence of Nehru stymied his efforts in any direction as ideologically they had differences on almost every issue. Patel had offered to resign but it was Gandhiji’s firm belief that both Nehru and Patel had to work in unison. The discussions between Gandhiji and Patel extended to more than an hour, beyond his scheduled prayer meet at 5:00 p.m. It had gathered such intensity that neither Manu nor Abha could muster the courage to interrupt.

At around seven minutes past five, it was Manu who dropped a silent message by gesturing at her watch. Gandhiji instantly took leave of Patel and was ready to begin his last walk to the prayer ground. Throughout the short journey he was supposed to have reprimanded his grand-nieces, ‘Why should I keep an eye on time? You are my time-keepers. I cannot tolerate even a minute’s delay at prayer’.

Gandhiji hurriedly climbed the five shallow, semi-circular steps that led to the raised part of the prayer ground, where the crowd opened out to allow a free passage to the moving cortege. This is when Nathuram was supposed to have rushed out of the crowd and bowed before Gandhiji as a token thanksgiving for whatever useful service he had rendered to the nation. As Manu tried to nudge him gently telling him that Gandhiji was already late for the prayer meet, he pushed her aside violently and in a split second fired the shots from an Italian Baretta pistol. The three bullets tore into the chest of the slender advancing frame. Gandhiji collapsed instantly and life ebbed away within minutes.

As blood oozed out and made Gandhiji’s homespun shawl turn a crimson red, Manu stole a glance at the Ingersoll watch that hung below his waist. The time of the second crucifixion in history, after that of Jesus, was recorded as seventeen minutes past five.

Support to Archaeological Survey of India [ASI] in the maintenance of monuments

Life teaches us to build on old foundations while being responsive to newer influences. Most of us however, appear insensitive to the timeless embrace of the past inasmuch as a prospective handshake with the future when it comes to safeguarding our cultural heritage. The misplacement of the original character of our ancient monuments indeed, makes for sad commentary. Many reasons could be attributed to this : human vandalism, rapid urbanization, use of improper materials, unauthorized excavations by ambi-sinister hands to illegal constructions in and around the premises.

The Archaeological Survey of India [ASI] has done a commendable job in preserving the awesome variety of India’s archaeological riches, which has helped prevent several monuments from being defaced by the ravages of time. Yet, despite the efforts, there is always a shortfall in terms of manpower and resources and therefore, the need is for a more robust participation of private business houses as also, NGOs, conservators, tourism authorities, even eminent historians and archaeologists for the results to be more prominent and visible.

I had once spoken to the ASI about the participation of private groups and donors in the maintenance of monuments and the process works out something like this. It involves contributions of the donor to be sent to the National Culture Fund (NCF), managed by an executive committee and a council chaired by the Union Minister of Culture and under which, several such projects can be sponsored. This form of cultural funding is to increase the participation of private entities in the decision-making process. 

The NCF is accountable to each donor in respect of the funds donated and facilitates all necessary clearances to them for the project that they choose to support. The donor has the right to appoint agencies to carry out the project work subject to pre-defined conditions laid down by the ASI which also specifies the activities permissible within the sites. There also is a project implementation committee to monitor the execution part while a project advisory committee looks after the overall functioning of the project.

Repair or restoration of course, is the first priority but it has to be conducted within a well-formulated set of archaeological principles, one of primary importance being the retention of the authenticity of the monument. In some cases the settlement of the foundation too has to be examined. However, only in extreme cases should steps be taken to restructure the monument, in part or in entirety. The participants, besides contributing to the actual maintenance, can also help in environmental development around the sites, up-gradation of existing museums in the vicinity and commissioning of new ones, proper illumination of the structure and distribution of relevant literature. They can also be a part of organized concerts, lectures, community festivals, permitted as per ASI regulations.

India has been known for its architectural heritage over several centuries. The purpose is to keep it relevant to the society, thus prudence dictates that we play the role of guardians and not oppressors. Supporting the ASI’s efforts assumes greater significance as all of us are stakeholders from a humanitarian perspective and need to forge a new relationship between the people and their heritage with a collective sense of ownership. Individually, let us create at least a ripple of consciousness even if not a mighty upsurge towards the preservation of a monument(al) legacy, lest it ends up languishing in the reflected glory of the past.

China surreptitious moves – a bitter offshoot of the 1962 war

China is at it again. Not long ago, there was news about its encroachment in Demchok in the Western sector and now soon after Xi Jinping’s offer of palliatives on maintaining the sanctity of the LAC, the Chumur region, 300 kms. North of Ladakh, is witnessing hectic movement of the PLA. The dispute over the LAC has raged for years on end, primarily because both in the Eastern and the Western sectors lie regions that have affiliations to India as well as China. Thus, territorial integrity from each others’ perspective is always brought into question.

Looking back over the years, China had begun the construction of a Western highway in the Aksai Chin region as early as 1954, to connect the Xinjiang region with Lhasa, thus providing it the only direct link with Tibet. The point of dispute was that Aksai Chin lay in the North-Eastern corner of the Ladakh region, claimed by India as its own legitimate territory.

Amazingly, even as late as 1959, Nehru willingly acknowledged in the Parliament that China had taken over more than 12,000 square miles of Indian territory in the process of constructing the highway, yet was unwilling to accept that they would ever resort to full-scale war, given India’s warm relations with the USSR and the implicit support of the US that was ready at hand. Ironically, both the US and the USSR were at that stage, engaged in the Cuban missile crisis and even as China was nibbling away at Indian territory, none of the two superpowers appeared upfront in coming immediately to India’s aid.

What began as small scale incursions led to a full fledged conflict in eastern Ladakh, stretching from the Karkoram Pass in the North to Demchok in South East. In the Eastern Sector, where the first firing occurred on 20^th of September, 1962, the reverses were as bad, for China advanced right up to the Namka Chu river across the Thag la ridge, decimated the 7^th brigade and went on to capture Bomdi La in the Kameng Division, the headquarters of the NEFA
Eventually, with the fall of the 48^th brigade on 20^th of November, no organized Indian defence was left either in the NEFA or the disputed territories in the Western sector. Clever as they come, the Chinese announced a cease-fire on 21^st of November, soon after the US and the USSR came to an agreement to resolve the missile crisis, thus rendering their own version of a fait-accompli on India. While China withdrew in the eastern sector, it refused to give up on the 38,000 sq.kms. of disputed Indian territory that it over-ran in and around the Ladakh region. Even as it maintains an eye of avarice over the NEFA, China remains a proverbial predator on the prowl in the Western sector, where the conflict of interest still relates to Aksai Chin, crucial to its continued hegemony over Tibet.

While both sides are sabre-rattling, where China holds an edge is that militarily its forces are far more expedient to patrol the frontier regions that have trills of vast, uninhabited areas. With their forces stationed in Tibet since years, they are physically better attuned to fighting at higher altitudes quite unlike their Indian counterparts. This was as bitter a truth in 1962 as it is today, even as the border stand-off appears all set for a longer haul.

A Mahatma’s tryst with martyrdom - an assassin’s moment of infamy

History records that on this day, 66 years ago, a most brutal of attacks by a fanatical Hindu took away from our midst one whom half the world venerated as a Saint – Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, who in death as in life, attained the cult status of a ‘Mahatma’, a pious soul.

Such was the inevitable fallout of the act that Nathuram Godse, the killer, deposed, ‘With the shots I fired at Gandhiji, my own life too came to an end’. An act of violent aggression followed by meek submission makes one wonder as to what exactly was the mind frame of the assassin prior to the killing. What exactly embittered his wisdom, his prudence to completely forsake his identity, his respect among his peers and resort to an act that would invite nothing but plain hatred from members of his own community?

That Nathuram was a bigoted Hindu is universally accepted. Belonging to a clan of Chitpawan Brahmins, the descendants of the mighty Peshwas, he was one among many who subsisted in the throes of a radical Hinduistic cult. But it is also true that he was not a history-sheeter and apart from a few alleged speeches that bordered on the vitriolic, did not have a criminal background. In fact, he was believed to have been a follower of Gandhiji once, but his views underwent a change once he became a member of the Hindu Mahasabha and came into contact with Savarkar. Soon it led to utter dissent from a disapproval of the very foundation of Gandhiji’s policies.

The fact that independence came at a price was something the militant Hindu groups, including Nathuram, were unwilling to accept, morally or politically. They believed Gandhiji’s cult of non-violence was tantamount to a kind of ‘violent pacifism’ that ran concomitant with his soft-pedalling a sensitive matter, leading to untold calamities on thousands of innocent members of their clan. Nathuram was to say, ‘It is absurd to expect 40 crore people to regulate their lives on such a lofty plane as non-violence’.

Truth to tell, it was Gandhiji’s teachings of absolute ‘Ahimsa’ that Nathuram was strongly opposed to as according to him, it was so detrimental to the cause of the Hinduism as to make it incapable at resisting inroads by other religions, thereby leading to its possible emasculation. It was a thought totally out of place but during the 1940s when the Hindu Sangathanist ideology had taken roots, a militant school of thought had emerged which propagated the view that for a true Hindu, the first duty was to serve Hinduism as a patriot as it constituted the well-being of one-fifth of human race. It called for all like-minded Hindus to fight as soldiers under a pan-Hindu flag and Nathuram, as one of its chief protagonists, believed that in his act, he was only serving a larger issue of ‘organized Hindu discontent’.

Nathuram had made a quizzical attempt at vainglory, ‘I have no doubt that honest writers of history will weigh my act and find its true value some day’. Well, in the six decades that have passed since, Gandhiji continues to be the supreme most symbol of our National unity while historians still find the act of the assassin as little more than the offshoot of a fanatical mind that had gone beyond the pales of rational thought or understanding.

Nehru and Patel – An Uneasy Alliance

Even as Sardar Patel has become a subject of frenetic discussion, his relationship with Nehru has kindled the imagination of overwrought historians and writers. While earnest efforts have been made to buttress the theory that despite ideological differences Nehru and Patel remained on the most affable of terms, the fact of the matter is quite different.

A throwback on the incidents reveals that in the 1929 Lahore session of Congress itself, Gandhiji had made clear his proclivity for Nehru as he bypassed Patel’s stronger credentials for the post of President. This may or may not have been a genesis to the feud that developed between Gandhi’s two most trusted lieutenants but the die had been cast.

When the idea of a Constituent Assembly was mooted in 1935, Nehru was supposed to have solicited Patel’s counsel in deciding upon the members of Congress’ Working Committee to be nominated for the Assembly. A corollary to this was Nehru’s socialist slant calling for non-acceptance of ministerial responsibilities in the provinces, as enshrined in the Act. Such socialist ideals were anathema to Patel’s rugged realism which called for an open stance on the acceptance of prospective minister-ships. A compromise was hatched and Congress did take up ministerial posts in 06 of the 11 provinces where they won in the provincial elections.

In 1946, with the formation of a provincial government at the Centre, Nehru inherited the responsibility of office and Gandhiji was there again to override the attempts of the Working Committee at canvassing for Patel. Whatever may have been his claims to down-pat neutrality, Gandhiji’s fondness for Nehru was palpable. Despite that Patel remained in his preferential upholstery too and Gandhiji’s rationale was that both Patel and Nehru were like ‘two oxen yoked to the governmental cart, one will need the other and both will pull together’.

Patel’s integration of the princely states was a gargantuan feat though Nehru with his fervid diplomacy was none too upfront at his Deputy’s direct military action to liberate Hyderabad from the Razakkars, the Nizam’s private army. Contrary-wise, when the demands for an autonomous Pakhtoonistan came up in independent Pakistan, Patel questioned Nehru’s impetuosity in visiting the frontier, thus playing into the hands of the anti-Congress forces who wanted it to be kept out of the Indian union.

Nehru’s political edifice stood on a socialist & secular plinth and he was weary of Patel’s allegedly rightist tilt, fuelled by his courtiers who made him believe that reactionary forces were being sheltered under Patel’s beneficent plumes. Though Gandhiji’s assassination brought them back together, the Nehru-Patel feud resurfaced during China’s invasion of Tibet. Nehru vacillated on whether to support China while Patel was insistent that India recognise Tibet’s bona-fides as an independent buffer so as to stymie China’s attempts at establishing hegemony in SE Asia. By 1950 Congress seemed divided ideologically into 02 camps but Patel’s death in December paved the way for Nehru to take full charge of the affairs.

Nehru and Patel did suffer from a clash of ideals, which did not make for felicitous tidings when it came to establishing a harmonious working relationship. Yet, their mutual respect and a reaffirmation of faith in each other were indisputable facts and given their irrefragable stature as individuals, both Patel and Nehru occupy a zenithal space in history as the ones who, for a major part shaped our nation’s collective destiny.

China’s Latest Incursions – A bitter testimony of Nehru’s ‘Forward Policy’

China’s incursions in the Ladakh region are the latest in its slew of border transgressions since 1962. What gives China the edge is its continued control over Aksai Chin, a significant area North of Ladakh, which allows it easy access to the India territory across the border.

If one were to look back, the fact is that by September 1962 itself, China had begun to make deep inroads in the North-Eastern territory, following their crossing the MacMohan Line. Through the mid to the late 50s, the Chinese were surreptitiously constructing a highway linking the provinces of Sinkiang and Tibet, through Aksai Chin. The Indian position in Ladakh was insecure as in those days, there was no road link to Leh.

The amazing part was that even as early as 1959, Jawaharlal Nehru, while presenting a ‘white paper’ in the Parliament, conceded that China had taken over more than 12,000 square miles of Indian territory but tried to assuage feelings by claiming that the Aksai Chin area was untenable where ‘not a blade of grass grows’. Still with growing demands for action, Nehru rather tremulously embarked on a ‘Forward Policy’ whereby, small posts with 5 to 10 men were to be set up in the areas claimed by the Chinese as theirs, more as a surveillance measure.

Nehru went on to say that any bit of aggression by the infiltrators would be given a befitting reply by the men commanding the posts. China took this as a sign of hostility on India’s part and mounted an insurgency that caught everyone off-guard. The posts proved unequal to the task of pushing back the infiltrators.

To divert the Chinese attention, the government struck the Chinese forces across the NEFA where they believed they were better placed. But this was a tactical blunder for the heavy casualties suffered by the Indian forces here led to China’s capturing the crucial Bomdi La in the Kameng Division, the headquarters of the NEFA command and coming close to taking over Chushul in the Ladakh valley which would have led them right up to Leh, the headquarters of Ladakh. Then all of a sudden China did a volte-face by withdrawing troops without of course, losing hold on Aksai Chin, where it still maintains hegemony.

The embarrassing reverses faced by the Indian Army in 1962 brought to cruel focus that for all of Nehru’s foresight, defence measures in terms of deploying adequate forces to safeguard the sensitive North-eastern sector where the Chinese always had interests, was never high on the list of priorities of his Government. Nehru believed in peaceful overtures to settle border disputes and had a perfect ally in Krishna Menon, his Defence Minister, who too believed in conservative use of forces.

Besides a loss of face, the war showed up how a marked dependence on diplomatic maneuvers at the expense of military preparedness could have the most disastrous of consequences. The failure of Nehru’s ‘Forward Policy’ continues to haunt India even as China, much to everyone’s embarrassment, continues with its surreptitious deeds.

‘Global Cataclysm’ - Governed by Harsh Realities

The discovery of ‘Higgs Boson’ or at least, a particle in closest approximation to it, had made for prominent headlines not too long ago. Known as the ‘God Particle’ it was considered the bi-product of a mechanism by which a hypothetical quantum field is generated that gives mass to elementary particles and thus, to the matter that makes up the entire Universe. But to the common man, the mystery of how the Universe was created is nothing beyond a convoluted jigsaw of scattered clues.

 

Something very similar had happened some four years ago when an experiment was about to be conducted then in a tunnel at the French-Swiss Border to discover the elusive particle. With the most formidable of atom smashers producing collisions of protons traveling at the speed of light, one group of theorists felt that it would be a discovery to beat all others in re-enacting the ‘big bang’ that had led to the creation of the Universe, while another, said it would unleash microscopic black-holes that might well be trapped in the earth’s gravitational field and threaten the very existence of our planet. Since then, experiments & theories have continued to make the rounds but there is no sign of an apocalypse as was feared.

 

But what foreshadows a future that is perilous is that we, as the inhabitants, are finding newer ways to push the world, closer & closer to a cataclysmic edge. So, more than the extraneous factors that threaten our existence, we are in the clutches of an internal mechanism that is squeezing life out of our planet.   

 

To what extent do we justify our existence as part of nature? For generations to come, we might leave behind a legacy that strips the Earth of its natural assets. The global threat occurring with the depletion of the Earth's ozone layer, the release of greenhouse gases due to rapid industrialisation, the massive deforestation leading to the extinction of rare species are collectively impacting the eco-system, just as the increasing use of chemicals in agriculture is resulting in steadily decreasing harvests and increasing soil erosion.

 

Is this the price we have to pay to perpetuate the process of evolution? Scientific theories do matter but we find that soon after being hot topics of discussion, they are relegated to a cosseted space till another glut of conjectures & inferences are drawn forth. The Earth happens to be a tiny speck in the Universe[al] gust but as the epi-centre of human existence, it cries out for a ‘planetary’ shift in the global consciousness of thought as dictated by harsh realities that cannot be sidestepped.

 

The cosmic process of evolution says that the Universe began as infinitesimally small and then expanded. About planet earth one fears a trend in the reverse; that its vastness could shrink to a raw, diminutive core. So each of us needs to participate in a process of creating a better world by understanding the purpose of the Universe and identifying ourselves within it for common good - as we own a common destiny.

Is there ample evidence on the ancient civilizations and their origins?

From an Indian perspective, the sites at Harrappa or the Indus Valley, which flourished across what is now Pakistan and north-west India, for long provided the earliest evidence of organized community living in this part of the world. Yet, even though they are accepted by general consensus as among the oldest of mature civilisations, the evidence that has been unearthed at the main and the proximal areas still remains relatively scarce to create an exegetical argument base for itself.

Like for instance, there is no evidence of the primary economic subsistence base, the system of government and rule, the degree of social stratification or the extent of the cultural sphere that governed the communities inhabiting the Harappan settlements. All that we have is some indication of the geographical extremity, the reasonably affluent lifestyles, the well-laid out civic amenities and some inter-regional trade.

Beyond the sub-continent, we find that the civilization that flourished in Mesopotamia also stretched back by a considerable stack of years and the first such traces in the region emerged during the Ubaid period between 6500 and 3800 BC. Now even during the pre-Harappan period, it is believed, purely on the basis of evidence unearthed, that civilization flourished in some form in the region of Mehrgarh (the Kachi plains of Baluchistan) during 7000-6500 BC. So, the earliest urban sites may have existed simultaneously in the Indus Valley and Mesopotamia. Another thing that was common to the two was the creation of scripts, indicative of intellectual advancements even then. While the Mesopotamian cuneiform writing has been deciphered somewhat, the Harappan script which is essentially ‘logographic’, is yet to be decoded.

Another discovery was in 2001, when an ancient submerged settlement in the Gulf of Cambay off the West coast of India, was traced back to around 7500 BC. Based on the study of the artifacts, Indian scientists propounded the theory of a ‘lost river civilisation’ and that the Harappans were descendants of an advanced mother culture that was submerged after the last glacial (ice) age by rising sea waters. What gives credence to this is that the last glacial age coincided with the Mesolithic period that pre-dates both Harappa & Mesopotamia, when the sea levels had fallen considerably and had then risen by several hundred metres, submerging many a flourishing civilization in the process. This was because after the glacial age, the continental ice sheets that had expanded, exhibited a reverse trend and gradually melted away leading to a rise in oceanic levels.

Some archaeologists have countered the genuineness of these artifacts as they have been recovered using the ‘dredging’ technique instead of being excavated by conventional means. Thus, there is no general consensus on whether the Gulf of Cambay is actually the ‘Cradle of Ancient Civilisation’ and not Mesopotamia, as is believed to be.

Thus, arguments and counter-arguments abound but the fact remains that civilization in its incipient stage, relating to the first ever organized urban community living, is yet to be identified with irrefutable evidence to support.

Bullfighting – No Longer a Spanish Past-time

Albert Einstein had once said, ‘If a man aspires towards a righteous life, his first act of abstinence should be injury to animals’. For all animal rights activists, a final adieu to the turgid spectacle of bullfighting in Spain  definitely is a moment to rejoice, though it is equivalent to a granular speck extricated from a copious sand-mound. In Spain, some have denounced it outright while for others it is a welcome break-away from an archaic, nay barbaric tradition. For a nation brought up on a fizzy fiesta of flamenco music & dance, decades of armed rebellion for Basque independence and the international dispute over Gibraltar, bullfighting has been an indelible cultural earmark, believed to have lasted since the reign of Emperor Claudius almost 2000 years ago. As Barcelona recently hosted the last of the controversial sport, it definitely marked a watershed in Hispanic history.

The fight itself as it unfolds makes for compelling study. In the Spanish lingo it is known as corrida de toros and the team consists of the matador and his assistants, 03 banderilleros and 02 picadores who appear during the first two stages, known as the tercio de varas and tercio de banderillas to provoke and tire the raging bull. The matador himself appears at the third stage called the tercio de muleta performing a number of passes, then jabs at the animal using sharp lances and finally subdues it using a sword or espada which is pushed over the horns and deep between the shoulder blades. If the sword goes in to the hilt, it is an estocada but if it hits the bone it is a pinchazo or media-estocada. An estocada usually results in the bull dropping down immediately and dying but if it survives, the matador takes the descabello, a sword with a protruding shaft, which he stabs straight into the bull’s neck severing the spinal cord.

Now what does one make of this scenario of unfettered blood & gore? If anything, it presents a sad picture as the Spaniards appear to take pride in the killing of a poor, helpless creature. Despite a custom having spawned generations on end, the raw and raucous undercurrents of it in making capital out of an animal’s protracted suffering cannot be justified. Going by the all-pervading law of nature, a spirit of mutual conviviality has to exist between all living species. It is again nature’s decree that man is bestowed with faculties superior to animals, so prudence dictates that we ought to be their guardians rather than oppressors. Such emotional palliatives apart, a tradition that has lasted through centuries is always going to evoke mixed reactions when it draws to a close. For the moment, Spain witnesses the dawn of a new epoch, even as the conscience-keeper of time and faith attempts to cull out a sordid chapter, whose contents no longer makes for worthy settings, from a nation’s chequered history.

Usage of Stone Tools In The Pre-Historic Age

Some interesting facts have come to light as per the latest findings of archaeologists during their latest excavations in far-off Kenya with regard to the tools used by human species in the pre-historic age.

Pre-historic classification based on Christian Thomas’ system deduces that stone, mainly flint was used as a weapon and a tool throughout the old stone (Paleolithic) and the middle stone (Mesolithic) ages. Chipped stone used by the earliest human species from Africa, were in fact, pieces of quartzite, a sort of metamorphosed rock formation. Such stone artifacts are easier to date as quartz itself is the commonest rock forming mineral resistant to chemical breakdown. As the quartz crystals themselves take millions of years to form, the stone weapons that have been located could have been chipped off rock structures extending to the earliest years of the old-stone age, about 3.5 million years ago.

The collection of picks and axes as mentioned in the report, which supposedly date back by 1.76 million years, relate to the Acheulean tool tradition, distinctly attributed to the Homo Erectus species, which existed about 1 to 2 million years ago, originating in Africa and extending beyond. However, the fact remains that the usage of stone tools had started much earlier. The first of the stone choppers that is believed to have existed was Australopethicus, a genus of extinct primates which pre-dates the hominid lineages of Homo Habilis & Homo Erectus.

According to noted anthropologists, Homo Habilis, which appeared about 2.3 million years ago, was scabrous in the use crude stone tools made from solid rock, some of which have been found in the Omo Valley in Africa. But the tools that have been recently recovered and have been in the news, definitely belong to a more complex school, requiring greater operational skills with their sharp, clean edges formed by removing flakes on either side along one face, to cut the sinewy portions of animal flesh. These have been ascribed to the Homo Erectus species as with their evolution, came the Acheulean hand-axe tradition that shaped stones to serve as scrapers, knives, hatchets & picks. The use of such tools enabled the species to move about untrammeled and occupy different habitats, leading to improved communication and better understanding among individuals. Having said so, it often becomes difficult for tools to be classified specifically to Homo Erectus or Homo Habilis, as the existence of both these species overlaps for at least 200,000 years.

Yet, the current findings establish beyond doubt that though in the course of hominid evolution, stone tools have existed in various forms almost 2 to 3 million years ago, the emergence of flaked stone tool-making constitutes a definitive evidence of a marked technological shift in the prehistoric age. Archaeological evidence has exhibited an increase in the complexity of stone technology up to varying degrees, which have helped extrapolate the more sophisticated stone-tool production modes that have evolved over a period of time.

The Twin Schools of Spiritual Hinduism

In the 5th Century B.C., both Buddhism and Jainism rose as spiritual orders that basically rebelled against Brahmanical Orthodoxy. Impregnated by the seeds of spiritual unrest, these twin offshoots yielded in the realm of history a harvest of new interpretations in religious broad-mindedness.

Both Gautama and Vardhamana who have come to be associated with the two cults as the paramount figureheads of their respective reform movements happened to be from the Kshatriya clan, who challenged the spiritual hegemony of the Brahmanas just as they refused to acknowledge the paramountcy of the Vedas. It was basically a clash of ideals between the governing and intellectual classes, each of whom brooked its own exclusivity in the social fabric of the society. Here it must be mentioned that neither Buddhism or Jainism were rigid schools of religious reform to the extent of attempting obliteration of Hinduism itself, in the sense that they never preached the abstinence of individual faith in the Hindu deities. Both existed as corollaries of the tenets enshrined in Hinduism and both alluded to a religious order that preached to the closest approximation, a chastity in words, thoughts and deeds as the means to salvation.

However, unlike Jainism which remained close to its Hinduistic origins in that it adhered to the rudiments of the caste system and ceremonial sanctity, Buddhism gradually was weaned away from the parent stock and thus, weakened its base in the country. While Jainism continues to flourish in its country of origin, spreading out of the Magadhan seat of imperial power to parts of North-West and to the Southern parts of India, Buddhism has been uprooted quite a bit and has gone on to flourish in South and South-East Asia. Several reasons have been cited for this. Even as many of the Buddhist doctrines came to be assimilated in the Hinduistic folds, the supremacy of the Brahamanic order that was challenged during the 5th and the 6th Centuries B.C., once again gained ascendancy during the age of the Guptas somewhere around the 3rd and the 4th centuries A.D., which mitigated the hold of Buddhism on the masses. Paradoxically, the neo-atheistic doctrines of Buddhism did not carry any level of conviction for the masses that was seeped in idolatory practices and sermons for centuries on end. Then of course, came the corruptible influences in the Buddhist monasteries and the religious order, followed by the horde of invasions which saw Buddhism lose much of its primal energy. The spirit of compassion and religious freedom thus, became a more potent antidote in far off lands that never required the Hinduistic crutch to flourish.

It must be admitted however, that both Buddhism and Jainism occupy a status of paramountcy in the religious orders that have flourished in India even though there is no definite period to delineate in history as either the Buddhist or the Jain period. Both are like the spiritual fountainheads that have attempted to create an outlet for human sufferings through the ever-flowing waters of purity and wisdom.

Lord Mahaveera and the Tenets of Jainism

The 6th Century B.C. witnessed the rise of the twin sects of Buddhism and Jainism in India following a period of spiritual unrest. They were both fallouts of a revolt against the orthodoxy as enshrined in the Brahamanical tenets of Hinduism and yet neither propagated the surrendering of one’s existing beliefs in the spiritual deities of the Hinduistic cult.

The founder of Jainism was believed to have been Lord Parasvanath, the 23rd Teerthankara (Prophet) of the Jain hierarchy, whose order of ascetics was governed by the four basic tenets – non-injury to life, truthfulness, abstinence from stealth and non-attachment to property. Historically, the religious sect of Jainism owes it genesis to Vardhamana (one who brings in peace and prosperity), the son of a Kshatriya noble called Siddhartha who ruled at Kundagram, Vaishali more than 2,500 years ago. Vardhamana was rechristened as ‘Mahaveera’ owing to the unusual strength he displayed at quite a young age. However, Mahaveera was not destined to be the powerful Emperor of Vaishali as everyone had anticipated for as time went by, He decided on a path of renunciation. Like the Holy Buddha, He too wanted to find a way for mankind to be rid of sorrows in a world torn asunder by the differences of cast, colour & creed. At the age of 26, He embraced the life of an ascetic and for 12 long years, led a life of deep penance, oblivious to pain or pleasure, food or starvation, sleep or awakening. It is believed that once, while seated under a Sal tree on the banks of the Rijuwalika river near the Parasvanath hills, he found ‘enlightenment’ as a ‘Jina’ - the one who understood the cause and the cure of sorrow. He acquired ‘Kewal Jnana’ or the only knowledge that is infinite and supreme. The ‘Jain’ or the ‘Jaina’ thus, was an offshoot of the ‘Jina’, the conqueror. Once he attained enlightenment, Lord Mahaveera emphasized upon freeing the soul of earthly bondage with the possession of three jewels – ‘right faith, ‘right knowledge’ and ‘right conduct’. His teachings espoused God as the extreme manifestation of all that is good in human soul. Thus, according to Him, ‘Nirvana’ or the state of final emancipation was attainable by one’s own efforts without the aid of a supreme authority, simply by controlling one’s passions and desires. The Jains came to be divided into ‘Swetambaras’, the white-robed and the ‘Digambaras’, who use no clothes in adherence to the stress on chastity, added by Lord Mahaveera as the fifth to the earlier four tenets of Jainism.

Unlike Buddhism that branched off considerably from its Hinduistic parentage Jainism kept itself closer to its origins and never really attempted any serious overtures outside India. Mostly it was confined to Bihar and parts of North India before extending to Gujarat, Rajputana and to the Southern parts of India.

During the thirty years of His teaching life, Lord Mahaveera, developed a sizeable number of followers to his religious order, before attaining immortal peace at the age of seventy-two at Pavapuri in Bihar around 527 B.C.

The Occult of Theosophy

It happens to us often in our lives, when we wonder – Is there a God and is there a universal order that follows God’s decree?’ It so happens that in spite of belonging to some religious order and following some fundamental basis of religion, we seek a more logical and more inspiring solution. The occult of Theosophy explores a rational explanation to these questions, as a body of ideas, not to be thrust upon an individual but offered for one’s own examination and judgment, for those united by a common search for truth and the desire to learn the meaning and purpose of existence by engaging themselves in study, reflection, purity of life and loving service.

Annie Besant (1847-1933), a reformer, humanist and educationist along with Madame Helena Petrovna Blavatsky (1831-1891), one of the outstanding spiritual figures of the 19th century – were the most forceful orators of the Theosophical Cult in India as a leaning towards the metaphysics of pure, unselfish life; to be ever ready to sacrifice one’s own pleasures for the others; of pursuing truth, goodness & wisdom for their own sake and not for the benefit that they may confer. It is a philosophy which renders life intelligible and demonstrates that justice and love guide the cosmos and its teachings aid the unfolding of the latent spiritual nature in the human being without dependence or fear.

Before she came to India, Dr. Besant, a radical freethinker, remained active in the British suffragist movement and an important speaker for women's suffrage. She moved to India to study Hindu ideas (karma, reincarnation, nirvana) which were foundational to the Theosophical school of thought in describing the universe as not just a place where nature’s forces operate by chance, but every event takes place according to certain laws inherent in the universe, which are the expressions of one’s consciousness. Theosophy as a cult outlines the vast schemes of life in which we are involved, the long route towards self-realisation. It says each man is his own lawgiver, the dispenser of glory or gloom to himself, the decreer of his reward, his punishment.

The abiding truth is that the nature of God resides in every man and woman, for we live, move and have our being in Him. Man has sought for the Almighty in many ways, but the one place where He can be found, never to be lost again is beyond emotion & intellect, in the depths of one’s own spirit. In other words, all that we postulate concerning God, of goodness, holiness, truth and beauty resides in a man, who as an immortal being, unfolds the divine powers that are latent within through repeated lives in mortal bodies. Theosophy primarily offers an optimistic view of life based on the law of natural justice – ‘As a man sows, that shall he reap’, which means that man is a master of his own destiny.

As a lateral perspective on divine wisdom, Theosophy emphasizes on the fact that the spirit of God is derived from the mind, the ‘spiritual soul’ using the mortal life of the man in whom it is captive. It militates against a religious thought that occurs at a level of sensibility not susceptible to reason. It concludes that the God in us – that is, the divine wisdom of justice, goodness & power alone should be our true and permanent love, our faith, which will never fail us even if all other things perish, which shall bring about our fundamental unity with all other living beings.

Nehru’s Letters to the US President and the Indo-China Conflict

China has been India’s bete-noire since the time a horde of Yuch-chi nomadic tribes from North-West China had overrun Indian territory in around 150 BC. Subsequently, the 1962 war, which resulted in an embarrassing loss of face to the Nehru Government, proved a watershed in Sino-Indian relations. In the context of the war, the two letters of Nehru, as addressed to John F. Kennedy, the then President of the US, that were recently made public, make for interesting reading. Apparently, they were reeled off in quick succession on 19th of November, 1962 after China had made deep inroads in the North-Eastern territory, following their crossing the MacMohan Line in the month of September.

In the first letter, Nehru thanked Kennedy for the ‘speed at which the urgently needed arms & ammunition were rushed to India’ and voiced his grievance at the ‘grim situation in the struggle for survival against an unscrupulous and powerful aggressor’. At the time of drafting of the two letters, China had all but captured Bomdi La in the Kameng Division, the headquarters of the NEFA command. A distraught Nehru also happened to address the nation acknowledging the serious reverses with the imminent takeover by the Chinese of Chushul in the Ladakh valley which would lead them to Leh, the headquarters of Ladakh. Within hours of dispatch of the first, Nehru reeled off a second letter, after the fall of the Sela Pass, requesting Kennedy for comprehensive air support in the form of ‘a minimum of 12 squadrons of supersonic all-weather fighters’ and for the US Air force personnel to ‘protect the radar installations from Chinese air attacks’. Nehru, despite a desperate need to deploy the nation’s own air force, expressed his inability to do so in his letter, as ‘the present state of India’s air and radar equipment did not provide a defence mechanism against retaliatory action by the Chinese’. All of this, became meaningless as the very next day, China declared a unilateral ceasefire and a withdrawal from most of the Indian territories that they had taken over, perhaps with a foreboding of the possible intervention of Western powers. They of course, refused to give up the highway stretch in Aksai Chin that gave them direct access to Tibet from Xingiang region.

But the harm had been done and India was downsized in a military showdown with China like never before. The events were a direct offshoot of a flawed defence policy, troops that were ill-equipped to fight the enemy in alien terrain and a lack of tactical resources. It was ironical that less than a decade of his rejecting Eisenhower’s offer of military aid with no strings attached, Nehru had to turn to the US for immediate air support with an unceremonious volte-face to India’s committed non-alignment policy.

Almost 50 years have since gone by, yet the vestiges of the war still remain. Despite friendly overtures by the Prime Ministers of both the countries recently, relations continue to be strained over boundary disputes, which seem unlikely to be resolved any time soon.

Is India Home to the Oldest Civilisation?

The discoveries of the Indus Valley Civilisation are now well-documented. It is also believed that the ruins of Harappa were first located when a British Engineer, John Brunton accidentally stumbled upon some bricks close to a railway line being laid to connect Lahore and Karachi towns in 1856. It wasn’t until the 1920s that Sir John Marshall carried out excavations at the site to fix a time-zone of 3250-2750 BC when civilization at the Indus Valley flourished. It is generally agreed upon that civilization took shape sometime between 8000 and 4000 BC.

There have been several theories on when and where did the oldest civilization take root. The most popular one is that it all began in what has come to be known as the 'cradle of civilisation', Mesopotamia, primarily because some human settlement has been sourced to the region during the Neolithic age which dates back to 7000 BC. However, concrete evidence points to the fact that civilization flourished in the region during the times of the ancient Sumerians, roughly coinciding with the Bronze age, which in turn, ran concurrent with the mature Harappan period during 3100-1900 BC. The rise of dynastic Egypt in the Nile Valley occurred in approximately 3200 BC, which is concurrent with the same age as the Sumerians and some of the oldest, but pre-civilized settlement relics found in China again date back to about 7000 BC.

In the North-West part of the sub-continent, the revolution is believed to have occurred somewhere around 8000-7000 BC when the use of metallic objects and agriculture for livelihood began. Based on the excavations carried out by a French Archaeologist, Jean-Francois Jarrige in 1974 around the Indus Valley region and from remnants of the pottery, the tools, as well as the human and animal bones, it has been concluded that even during the pre-Harappan period, some form of civilization existed in the Kachi plains of Baluchisthan, specifically the region of Mehrgarh dating back to 7000-6500 BC, arguably the earliest urban site identified that pre-dates all others in substantial measure. Another evidence of a ‘lost river civilisation’ was found in 2001, when marine archaeologists detected signs of an ancient submerged settlement in the Gulf of Khambhat off the West coast of India in Gujarat and carbon dating of one of the wooden samples has fixed the period to 7500 BC.

So could it be that the most ancient forms of civilization existed in this part of the world? If one takes into account that life on earth has existed over 2 lakh years of which the pre-historic age dates back to the best accuracy of about 10000 to 8000 BC, it is hard to establish facts as incontrovertible truths, based on research that at best stretches over a few decades. But the fact remains that no form of civilization pre-dating 7000 BC that is representative of organized community living, has been identified with a level of certainty as yet and some of the ones that did seem to have existed during the period have been sourced to the sub-continent.

Honour Killings – Blatant Transgressions of Human Laws!!

A series of incidents related to ‘honour killing’ are coming to light with a promptitude that defies logic. The slaying of young couples is based simply on the premise that the family’s honour is sacrosanct and thus, supersedes all forms of attachment to the kin. Then we have had a glut of human rights activists & NGOs filing petitions to introduce new legislations that would curb this burgeoning menace.

What exactly is the sin of the girl or the boy in question to be condemned to eternal perdition? Simply that they undertook a peremptory pledge to spend the rest of their lives together as two like-minded human beings would and justifiably, should with regard to the Universal law of nature. This has set me thinking as to what ideals, morals & ethics fall within the ambit of human survival, which one believed held good so long as you are true to yourself and to the laws of the Universe. Bernard Gert, a philosopher of ethics & utilitarianism had propounded a theory on moral rights based on the hypothesis that every human had a right ‘not to be killed’ inasmuch as ‘not to be deprived of basic freedom’.

In fact, every human faces the ethical dilemma of choosing his or her actions in such a way as would be morally acceptable to everybody and that one’s motives would be constructive rather than exploitative. In that sense, a couple which defies age-old conventions is bound to attract some amount of indignation, yet, the fundamental basis of human rights is that everyone should be treated as a free individual to execute his or her own will within the permissible laws. So, as long as two adults are compatible, it appears quite a travesty that the ruse of ‘family honour’ could be used as a bayonet to fragment their moral & spiritual union.

The Universal declaration of human rights validates what Immanuel Kant in his metaphysical thesis on morality had stated – ‘an action could be deemed morally right for a person if he acts in such a way that the maxim is generalized or becomes universally applicable’. For such families who are fettered by the strongholds of orthodoxy and thus, indulgent in such barbaric acts, the question that needs to be answered is whether they would be accepted unanimously and whether every other person would have acted on similar lines given the exigencies of the same situation.

The ambit of the society stretches out to castes and sub-castes so that it often does not result in similar interpretation of moral rules. Yet, in spite of this, nature has bestowed in varying capacities the power to freely choose the aims that each one of us desire to pursue. Thus, ‘honour killings’ committed without a sense of guilt or shame are nothing but transgressions of natural laws beyond acceptable or defensible limits, whereby, a person’s basic rights to live and to co-exist in harmony & peace are being ruthlessly trampled upon.

A Carbon-conserving Economy for Environmental Sustenance

We all are bearing the brunt of one of the hottest summers ever. As one grapples with the scorching clammy heat, there is an intense desire to be swathed in the summer-cooled sheaths in a ceaselessly ‘arid’ zone. The successive climatic changes are a clear pointer to the fact that the summers are getting longer and more ruthless with every passing year.

We may truthfully say of our ancestors that for years on end, they left the earth quite vibrant & undamaged. People lived a modest life based on limited renewable energy sources for centuries together on planet earth, which consisted of a combined availability from plant growth and the power of sun, wind & water for their sustenance. However, the industrial revolution in the later part of the 18th century, gave humanity the power to start exploring the rich stores of fossil fuels that had accumulated in the earth’s crust over several million years. As a result, human power and thus, the damaging impacts of human activities in a way, grew exponentially.

Since then, the world over, industrial and urban development has been driven by an increase in the burning of fossil fuels and as an offshoot, our continuing our reliance on them. According to most estimates, oil, coal and natural gas presently account for more than 80% of the energy throughout the world. This raises two questions. First, fossil fuels are non-renewable and every barrel of oil and ton of coal that we burn is lost for use by future generations. Second, combustion of fossil fuels continues to dump billions of tons of carbon-dioxide in the atmosphere. By an estimate, only about half of our annual emissions of some 10 million tones of carbon is currently being absorbed by the biosphere, which is likely to create potentially disastrous long-range effects on the climate. Even though, there are about 20 so-called greenhouse gases that make up the earth’s atmosphere, scientists are primarily concerned about the increase in the levels of carbon-dioxide since it is difficult to quantify the exact cause and effect of the others. However, it can be safely concluded that the capacity of the biosphere to absorb these gases is being reduced majorly through deforestation, erosion and depletion of carbon-rich soil by unsustainable farming methods. The more of the carbon-dioxide build-up, the more heat trapped near the Earth and thereby, raising the temperatures alarmingly worldwide. Thus, the challenges facing us are not just to reduce annual global carbon-dioxide emissions but also their annual concentrations in the atmosphere.

The mainstream of environmental ethic can be realised in terms of the principles which reduce industrial expansion and energy consumption and forbid the use of non-renewable resources like fossil fuels in ways which would threaten their future availability. We must therefore, find the means for sustaining the natural world in such a way as to create a viable future for humanity on a finite planet. A transition to a carbon-conserving economy thus, would be vital for climatic protection and human security.

Kakori Conspiracy [25th August, 1925] – A Historical Testament

A small district oblivious of its historical moorings lies 14 km. North of Lucknow. Kakori, once a flourishing town famous for Urdu poetry & literature, is the seat of Qadiria Qalandria Sufi order. Among its eminent personalities were Mohsin Kakorvi, a great poet of the ‘na’at’ genre and Noorul Hasan Nayyier, the compiler of Noorul Lughaat, among the most authentic of Urdu dictionaries. It traces back the Abbasi clan that claims lineage to Al-Abbas, an uncle of Prophet Mohammed. Nawab Ishtiaq Ahmed Abbasi, a noted lawyer from the district was married to Akhtari Faizabadi, who rose in stature as ‘Begum of Kakori’. She was none other than the legendary Begum Akhtar, who also earned the sobriquet of ‘Mallika-e-Ghazal’.

The town attained national eminence on 9th August 1925 with the ‘Kakori Conspiracy’, a well-documented testament of India’s freedom struggle, when a group of revolutionaries braved death to capture the British treasury being ferried in the Shahjahanpur-Lucknow section of the Northern Railway. These brave young men shared a common affiliation as members of the Hindustan Republican Association [HRA], later re-christened as Hindustan Socialist Republican Association [HSRA] whose sole aim was to overthrow the British rule through armed revolution. When caught, most of them were either hanged or deported for life for trials under the Birtish were generally farcical.

As the legend goes, one of its members, Pt. Ramprasad Bismil, who often traveled the Shahjahanpur-Lucknow route, observed that the British treasury was loaded and transported to Lucknow with the minimum of security measures. This is how the seed of thought to loot the treasure-chest germinated in his mind, to help fund the activities of the HRA. At the fall of dusk, when Number 8 Down was about to touch Kakori, the group of revolutionaries that had boarded the train, pulled the chain and overpowered the guard. The steel box carrying the cash was pulled out. Though, it had a hole in the middle through which cash used to be dumped in, the box was so huge that no hand could reach down below to pull out the currency notes. It required a few hefty blows by a stout Ashfaqullah Khan to break open the lock. A sum of Rs. 10,000/- of the British Treasury was taken out and transferred to gunny bags which were then carried away by the revolutionaries in batches.

For a while, no one was captured though investigations had begun in the right earnest. The HRA, however, was not a well-organised group and as expected, once the British dragnet was spread, all the revolutionaries involved in the act were rounded up. Pt. Ramprasad Bismil, Ashfaqullah Khan, Rajendra Lahiri & Roshan Singh were awarded capital punishment, which may appear undeservingly harsh, for all they did was to purloin a diminutive portion of the Government coffers. But it was not so simple. Apparently, during the hold-up, despite the warnings to the passengers not to leave their seats, one European attempted to slip out and was shot dead. That, besides the audacity of the act, was reason enough for stringent court reprisals, for in those days, killing a ‘white’ was considered the most heinous of crimes. Despite a nationwide clamour for mercy, all four were hanged in November 1927. In their poignant memory, a ‘Shaheed Smarak’ has been established just adjacent to the exact spot of the incident, which is identified by an isolated stele (1085 km./47) erected on the left side of the railway track, 02 km. beyond the Kakori station.

This heart-wrenching saga of sacrifice & valour is described somewhat aptly by these lines of Mirza Zauq, set to tune by Khaiyyam and embellished in the vocals of the erstwhile ‘Begum of Kakori’ – ‘Layee hayaat aaye, qazaa le chali chale, apni khushi na aaye, na apni khushi chale..’. Farewell to you, O brave soldiers of the revolution!

15th August, 1947 - A Nation's Tryst With Destiny

At the stroke of the midnight hour on the on the 15th of August, 1947, India attained independence and a day before, Lord Mountbatten was at Karachi to inaugurate the Dominion of Pakistan. Thus, two new Dominions came into existence to usher in an era of communal peace & amity in the sub-continent. On the eve of the occasion, Nehru’s famous extempore on our ‘tryst with destiny’ and the arrival of a day to ‘redeem our pledge’ is now well entrenched as a voluble testament in the annals of Indian history.

Let us trace down the sequence of events from a year before the D-day –16th of May, 1946 to be precise - when the historic ‘Cabinet Mission Plan’ was drawn up after two months of deliberations, one which both the Congress and the Indian Muslim League had initially agreed to, on principle. This was perhaps, the first major step by the British to eventually hand over the reins to their subjects, with the formation of an ‘Interim Government’ comprising mainly of the Congress and the Indian Muslim League members. It was described by Gandhiji himself as ‘the best document the British could have produced in the circumstances’.

Initially, the League accepted the Plan in toto but then suddenly back-tracked as they felt that the Congress had reneged on the clause, which called for the grouping of provinces and wanted to go into the Constituent Assembly with a sense of hegemony. With the benefit of hindsight, this was perhaps, justified as the League had accepted the Plan on the basis of distribution among the Centre, the Provinces and the Groups. Nehru’s statement during the AICC meet on the 17th of July, 1946 in Mumbai, that the Congress had only accepted a participation in the Constituent Assembly and nothing else, added fuel to fire. That the Congress did not accept the Plan in its entirety, after having consented just a month earlier, sowed the seeds of doubt in the minds of their counter-parts. Jinnah’s plea for a vivisection purely on religious grounds suddenly gathered momentum, through his fragile premonition that the two communities could never live together peacefully in an Independent India.

This is where Lord Wavell might have erred in his judgment, when he invited Nehru to head the Interim Government leaving out the Muslim League - who had decided to boycott it - instead of trying further to bring the warring factions together. 16th of August, 1946, was a calumny in India’s political history when Jinnah played a final, desperate card calling for a ‘Direct Action Day’, which on principle, was ‘Pakistan Day’. Who would have realized that exactly a year before the dawn of independence, destiny would have unleashed a carnage - a 4-day terror regime that would claim close to 6000 lives.

The Interim Government was formed on the 2nd of September, 1946 and Congress adopted the resolution that India should be a Democratic Republic. Nehru, in his own capacity extended the offer to the League to join the Interim Government, which was crucial to curb the communal conflagrations that had gripped the nation, which they did after a lot of persuasion on the 15th of October, 1946. However, by this stage the feeling of suspicion, distrust & mutual antipathy had made such deep inroads in both the Congress and the League that there was no way the Interim Government was going to function smoothly. Even as the Constituent Assembly used to be in session, the League members boycotted it time and again. As the Congress and the League were at dagger’s drawn on every possible issue, ranging from Defence to Home to Finance to Communications, partition began to appear an inevitability and even as Lord Mountbatten arrived in India, the Congress had reconciled itself to Pakistan as a ‘lesser evil’.

With the mounting communal passions, the Labour Government headed by Clement Atlee took a conscious decision on the 20th of February, 1947 that power must be transferred before the 30th of June, 1948 to responsible Indian hands. Subsequently, the White Paper, based on the plan formulated by Lord Mountbatten, to partition India, was given constitutional approval by the British Parliament and finally the Royal Sanction on the 18th of July, 1947, which became a qualifying decree to the fate of 40 crore Indians, who had for centuries lived in peace and amity.

In retrospect, what would have happened if Lord Wavell had been able to convince Atlee not to make haste and hold on to the reins a little longer? What if he had not been forced to resign to be replaced by Mountbatten, who had pre-meditated every one of his moves before landing in India? What if the Congress Working Committee had agreed unanimously to have Jinnah at the helm of affairs? Could we have avoided the discomfiture of a divided nation?

Such questions shall be raised time and again without any tangible answers. It has been 62 years since we gained independence; let us savour as of now.

HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY TO ALL!!

Racial Attacks in Australia

Australia sadly has been on a scurrilous boil of late. So many Asians have faced the brunt of racial attacks that have been burgeoning with alarming promptitude and despite the palliatives extended by the Australian Government to somehow quell the conflagrations, sporadic incidents are coming to light almost every other day.

I on a personal level find these to be exceedingly painful as they are in direct contrast to the convivial spirit that prevailed during the two years that I happened to be in Australia, from 1995 to 1997. I happened to pursue my Master’s degree from an Institute called Charles Sturt University in NSW that accommodated a wide conglomerate of international students from the Asian sub-continent. Initially, I did face up to the onerous task of adapting to a culture that straddled between the bohemian and the hedonistic. What at first, struck me as a trait atypical of the Aussies was their brash outspokenness. And I must admit I too was at the short end of the stick a number of times. At the same time, flashes of humour would break through the hard crust of a rugged exterior. The Aussies generally never shouted, just a broad grin or a twitch of the eyebrows would communicate anger, which at worst would be articulated in hushed or muted overtones.

The Aussies generally took pride in their white bona-fides but certainly not to the extent of deriding one who was ‘coloured’, so to speak! I for one shared a cottage during my tenure with four Australians and I can say in all sobriety that there wasn’t a single instance when I felt sidelined or isolated. However, it was expected of us to exercise restraint and not to press for equality of status in the social hierarchy with the Aussies, an unwritten code that we adhered to till the very end. As such, whatever merry-making we indulged or participated in had to strike a balance – not being superfluously copious but neither being scrupulously reserved.

Australia in truth has always had a chequered history. The native Aborigines there have been carrying out a movement for equal rights for years on end, despite the fact that their cultural moorings are protected with the passing of the Aboriginal and Torrets Islander Heritage Protection Act in 1984, which is but small consolation for them. So in a sense, discrimination in some form has always been conspicuous in the Australian society. Yet it appears so very perplexing as to how a nation, otherwise so very adaptive and accommodative of eclectic cultures and diverse backgrounds, could appear so diminutive at the hands of some vindictive elements and their improprieties that nothing but sheer ignorance could have heaped upon them. Such acrimony is nothing but the manifestation of the most corruptible of influences. Having said that, the stream of time is constantly washing the dissoluble fabrics of all individuals and from that standpoint one should take this to be a passing phase, which would eventually see the Asian community emerge stronger & united out of their ordeals. Amen!!