Essay on The Cultural unity forms a Nation

It is easy to disunite the people than even to create a facade of unity. It is a common phenomenon in all the Third World Countries and those under Communistic regime. The society remains stuck to the dictatorial order; and it seems as if there is unity.

The final fate of Yugoslavia and Czechoslovakia is known to the world. Even the fourteen republics of USSR fell apart like a house of cards as soon as the Communist control was withdrawn. If military Junta or the dictators allow freedom to the people in African continent internecine wars among the clans are expected to ravage most of the nations.

China alone is a country that is shedding the dark leaves of Communism in a phased manner and instead of breaking is returning to its past glory in a different way. Unlike Latin America (South America) India is a comparatively compact whole after independence. Still there are certain dark patches that have spoiled the national fabric. Before the Mauryan era it was a house divided. Alexander took advantage of the disunity of the feudal kings. The efforts of Chanakya made the nation again rise and achieve its pristine glory.

Middle ages being the age of feudal kings too India again reaped the harvest of defeats at the hands of foreign powers since the seventh century. The long reign of Islamic rulers and the European ones, specially Great Britain, left deep scars of mental slavery even after independence.

The forcible conversions by the Muslim rulers changed the face of the nation. It created pockets of influence throughout the country that got the vivisection of the country. The physical phenomenon was bad of course, but worse was the mental aptitude that has been responsible for the apparent, disguised or underground efforts not to allow the country to remain a united nation.

Although European powers withdrew from India, they left an army of highly educated henchmen on the one hand and a large number of missionaries on the other. The educated young men took for granted all the theories propounded by their past masters.

The missionaries worked mostly among the tribal’s-got a very large number of them converted to Christianity. They propagated the myth that the tribal’s had no religion of their own. They gave them religion. They changed the very map of the North Eastern Region. They created an atmosphere of alienation against the main stream of the nation in the North Eastern Region.

The misleading propaganda there was that the North Eastern Region has been ignored because of ethnic differences. It was not difficult to let them believe that they belonged to the Mongolian race. As such they were nearer to the Chinese rather than to Indians. Their facial structure, language, names all were given example of. The result is lava of secessionism flows in the backwaters of the Seven Sisters of the North East. Withdraw armed forces from the region and see what happens.

No less important is the grooming of a whole martial group that was formed to save the Hindus from the onslaught of Muslim invaders. Queer enough the bearded Hindus were posed against the unbarred ones. Under the guise of a movement against the brahmanical order it found its roots among the illiterate Sikhs in Punjab. Fed by the earlier foes the Muslims and the Birtons it gained ground as another secessionist movement in the border state of Punjab. It got even the then USA President Bill Clinton on its side. Australia backed it and ISI of Pakistan supported it.

How an extraordinary large number of converts can be cohorts with their religious peers aiming at the destabilizing of a full region can be seen in Jammu and Kashmir. The support comes from the Islamic nations besides some European countries who would not like to see a region coming closer again after they could manipulate in getting it divided. India stands a loser not simply on its own land but in a number of International fora on the issue. The movement of secessionism has reached the peak in the area.

It is said myths don’t sustain long. But the ones propounded by our past masters have gained more ground than they had when the Britons were here. The British concocted the theory of Aryan invasion on India. The motive was double edged. They wanted to create a gulf between the highly cultured Tamilians and the people above the Vindhyas i.e.; the Hindi belt. Their other motive was to keep themselves at par with the Aryans and the Muslims who invaded India. They too did it and had a right to settle here as the Aryans and Muslims had.

Navaratha S. Rajaram, a US based scientist and a former adviser to National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), USA, S.S. Mishra a BHU scholar, Srikant Talageri, the writer of ‘Aryan Invasion Theory and Indian Nationalism’ S.R Gupta a former Director of Allahabad Museum, Koenraad Elst writer of ‘Indigenous Indians: Agastya to Ambedkar’ and, many South Indian scholars participating in a seminar organised by the Mythic, Society, Bangalore opined that Aryans did not come to India from anywhere. They ‘were indigenous to the country’.

On the other hand Dr. Robert J. Zydenbos, a European Ideological scholar, residing in Mysore sticks to the old theory that the Aryans came to India from Central Asia. He goes on to refer Zvelebil who considers that the Dravidians too migrated to India ‘from the northwest still prior to the Aryans’. These are all academic exercises.

Migration of people from one land to the other was a common feature in the past. Many invaders—the Huns, the Shakas and a number of soldiers of the Army of Alexander remained in India and mingled with the people beyond recognition.

Saxons moved to Great Britain and formed the Anglo- Saxon nation of Great Britain. Coming close to one another forming a big compact nation like Switzerland, Belgium and USA is a modern phenomenon going on in Europe after the middle Ages.

Once the people are settled on a land first they are ethnically bound to become one cultural unit later on. Their languages and customs co-exist. Their religious identity too is intermingled. That is what happened in India too. It is this cultural amalgamation that formed the Indian nation millenniums back. The so called Aryan traditions and the Dravidian one’s both had their birth in this land and overlapped one another. That is why most of the religious saints sprouted from the South—specially from Tamil speaking regions have a sway over whole of the country.

Many social agrarian and political movements started from Bengal, Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Gujarat and Maharashtra that covered the South too in having reforms in the society and in throwing away the foreign regimes a number of times.

Keeping the political leverage away, shedding away any type of superiority complex, throwing the dirt of caste regime into sea, bracing equality and equanimity and giving a firm united existence to the so called ethnic group will make the nation culturally strong. It is this real cultural strength on which the mansion of the nation is built.