Independent India: Dynastic blunders (nehru gandhi dynasty)
Independent India: Dynastic blunders
For over forty years after independence, India was ruled directly or
indirectly by the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty. As a result, national interest
was often sacrificed for personal dynastic interests. On at least three
occasions, Nehru sacrificed India's interests for the sake of
international glory for himself. First is his well-known blunder of
referring Kashmir to the United Nations when Indian troops were on the
verge of driving the Pakistanis out of Kashmir. The next was his
betrayal of Tibet to please China and gain glory for himself in Korea.
The third was his failure to settle the border with China because of
his preoccupation with his fantasy of Pancha Sheel. Nehru's colossal
blunder in Kashmir is well known, so I will briefly discuss his fiasco
in dealing with Tibet and China.
But first I want to highlight an important but often overlooked point.
It was not Pakistan that created the Kashmir problem. Nehru created the
problem with his two blunders: referring Kashmir to the United Nations
and agreeing to the present cease fire line or the LOC. At the very
least Nehru should have asked for the Indus River as the Line of
Control. Similarly, what I want to next is explain that it was not
China but again Nehru that created the border problem with China with
his multiple blunders. With his blunder upon blunder Nehru sacrificed
thousands of lives- both soldiers and civilians. His grandson Rajiv
Gandhi contributed his own share of blunders by sending Indian troops
into Sri Lanka unprepared. Let me next examine the Chinese scene.
..
Nehru and the China-Tibet blunder
In the year 1950, two momentous events shook Asia and the world. One
was the Chinese invasion of Tibet, and the other, Chinese intervention
in the Korean War. The first was near, on India's borders, the other,
far away in the Korean Peninsula where India had little at stake. By
all canons of logic, India should have devoted utmost attention to the
immediate situation in Tibet, and let interested parties like China and
the U.S. sort it out in Korea. But Jawaharlal Nehru, India's Prime
Minister, did exactly the opposite. He treated the Tibetan crisis in a
haphazard fashion, while getting heavily involved in Korea. India today
is paying for this folly by being the only country of its size in the
world without an official boundary with its giant neighbor. Tibet soon
disappeared from the map. As in Kashmir, Nehru sacrificed national
interest at home in pursuit of international glory abroad.
India at the time maintained missions in Lhasa and Gyangtse. Due to the
close relations that existed between India and Tibet going back
centuries and also because of the unsettled conditions in China,
Tibet's transactions with the outside world were conducted mainly
through India. Well into 1950, the Indian Government regarded Tibet as
a free country.
The Chinese announced their invasion of Tibet on 25 October 1950.
According to them, it was to 'free Tibet from imperialist forces',
and consolidate its border with India. Nehru announced that he and the
Indian Government were "extremely perplexed and disappointed with the
Chinese Government's action..." Nehru also complained that he had
been "led to believe by the Chinese Foreign Office that the Chinese
would settle the future of Tibet in a peaceful manner by direct
negotiation with the representatives of Tibet..."
This was not true, for in September 1949, more than a year before the
Chinese invasion, Nehru himself had written: "Chinese communists are
likely to invade Tibet." The point to note is that Nehru, by sending
mixed signals, showing more interest in Korea than in Tibet, had
encouraged the Chinese invasion; the Chinese had made no secret of
their desire to invade Tibet. In spite of this, Nehru's main interest
was to sponsor China as a member of the UN Security Council instead of
safeguarding Indian interests in Tibet.
Because of this, when the Chinese were moving troops into Tibet, there
was little concern in Indian official circles. Panikkar, the Indian
Ambassador in Beijing, went so far as to pretend that there was 'lack
of confirmation' of the presence of Chinese troops in Tibet and that
to protest the Chinese invasion of Tibet would be an "interference to
India's efforts on behalf of China in the UN". So Panikkar was more
interested in protecting Chinese interests in the UN than India's own
interests on the Tibetan border! Nehru agreed with his Ambassador. He
wrote, "our primary consideration is maintenance of world peace...
Recent developments in Korea have not strengthened China's position,
which will be further weakened by any aggressive action [by India] in
Tibet." So Nehru was ready to sacrifice India's national security
interests in Tibet so as not to weaken China's case in the UN!
It is nothing short of tragedy that the two greatest influences on
Nehru at this crucial juncture in history were Krishna Menon and K.M.
Panikkar, both communists. Panikkar, while nominally serving as Indian
ambassador in China, became practically a spokesman for Chinese
interests in Tibet. Sardar Patel remarked that Panikkar "has been at
great pains to find an explanation or justification for Chinese policy
and actions." India eventually gave up its right to have a diplomatic
mission in Lhasa on the ground that it was an 'imperialist legacy'.
This led to Nehru's discredited 'Hindi-Chini Bhai Bhai'. Mao had
no reciprocal affection for India and never spoke of 'Chini-Hindi
Bhai Bhai' - or its Chinese equivalent. Far from it, he had only
contempt for India and its leaders. Mao respected only the strong who
would oppose him, and not the weak who bent over backwards to please
him.
Sardar Patel warned Nehru: "Even though we regard ourselves as friends
of China, the Chinese do not regard us as friends." He wrote a famous
letter in which he expressed deep concern over developments in Tibet,
raising several important points. In particular, he noted that a free
and friendly Tibet was vital for India's security, and everything
including military measures should be considered to ensure it. On
November 9, 1950, two days after he wrote the letter to Nehru, he
announced in Delhi: "In Kali Yuga, we shall return ahimsa for ahimsa.
If anybody resorts to force against us, we shall meet it with force."
But Nehru ignored Patel's letter. The truth is that India was in a
strong position to defend its interests in Tibet, but gave up the
opportunity for the sake of pleasing China. It is not widely known in
India that in 1950, China could have been prevented from taking over
Tibet.
Patel on the other hand recognized that in 1950, China was in a
vulnerable position, fully committed in Korea and by no means secure in
its hold over the mainland. For months General MacArthur had been
urging President Truman to "unleash Chiang Kai Shek" lying in wait in
Formosa (Taiwan) with full American support. China had not yet acquired
the atom bomb, which was more than ten years in the future. India had
little to lose and everything to gain by a determined show of force
when China was struggling to consolidate its hold.
In addition, India had international support, with world opinion
strongly against Chinese aggression in Tibet. The world in fact was
looking to India to take the lead. The highly influential English
journal The Economist echoed the Western viewpoint when it wrote:
"Having maintained complete independence of China since 1912, Tibet has
a strong claim to be regarded as an independent state. But it is for
India to take a lead in this matter. If India decides to support
independence of Tibet as a buffer state between itself and China,
Britain and U.S.A. will do well to extend formal diplomatic recognition
to it."
So China could have been stopped. But this was not to be. Nehru ignored
Patel's letter as well as international opinion and gave up this
golden opportunity to turn Tibet into a friendly buffer state. With
such a principled stand, India would also have acquired the status of a
great power while Pakistan would have disappeared from the radar screen
of world attention. Much has been made of Nehru's blunder in Kashmir,
but it pales in comparison with his folly in Tibet. As a result of this
monumental failure of vision - and nerve - India soon came to be
treated as a third rate power, acquiring 'parity' with Pakistan.
Two months later Patel was dead.
Even after the loss of Tibet, Nehru gave up opportunities to settle the
border with China. To understand this, it is necessary to appreciate
the fact that what China desired most was a stable border with India.
With this in view, the Chinese Premier Zhou-en-Lai visited India
several times to fix the boundary between the two countries. In short,
the Chinese proposal amounted to the following: they were prepared to
accept the McMahon Line as the boundary in the east - with possibly
some minor adjustments and a new name - and then negotiate the
unmarked boundary in the west between Ladakh and Tibet. In effect, what
Zhou-en-Lai proposed was a phased settlement, beginning with the
eastern boundary. Nehru, however, wanted the whole thing settled at
once. The practical minded Zhou-en-Lai found this politically
impossible. And on each visit, the Chinese Premier in search of a
boundary settlement, heard more about the principles of Pancha Sheela
than India's stand on the boundary. He interpreted this as
intransigence on India's part.
China in fact went on to settle its boundary with Mayammar (Burma)
roughly along the McMahon Line following similar principles. Contrary
to what the Indian public was told, the border between Ladakh (in the
Princely State of Kashmir) and Tibet was never clearly demarcated. As
late as 1960, the Indian Government had to send survey teams to Ladakh
to locate the boundary and prepare maps. But the Government kept
telling the people that there was a clearly defined boundary, which the
Chinese were refusing to accept.
What the situation demanded was a creative approach, especially from
the Indian side. There were several practical issues on which
negotiations could have been conducted - especially in the 1950s when
India was in a strong position. China needed Aksai Chin because it had
plans to construct an access road from Tibet to Xinjiang province
(Sinkiang) in the west. Aksai Chin was of far greater strategic
significance to China than to India. (It may be a strategic liability
for India - being expensive to maintain and hard to supply, even more
than the Siachen Glacier.) Had Nehru recognized this he might have
proposed a creative solution like asking for access to Mount Kailash
and Manasarovar in return for Chinese access to Aksai Chin. The issue
is not whether such an agreement was possible, but no solutions were
proposed. The upshot of all this was that China ignored India -
including Pancha Sheel - and went ahead with its plan to build the
road through Aksai Chin.
This is still not the full story. On the heels of this twin blunder -
abandonment of Tibet and sponsorship of China, with nothing to show in
return - Nehru deceived the Indian public in his pursuit of
international glory through Pancha Sheel. Pancha Sheel, which was the
principal 'policy' of Nehru towards China from the betrayal of
Tibet to the expulsion of Dalai Lama in 1959, is generally regarded as
a demonstration of good faith by Nehru that was exploited by the
Chinese who 'stabbed him in the back'. This is not quite correct,
for Nehru (and Krishna Menon) knew about the Chinese incursions in
Ladakh and Aksai Chin but kept it secret for years to keep the illusion
of Pancha Sheel alive.
General Thimayya had brought the Chinese activities in Aksai Chin to
the notice of Nehru and Krishna Menon several years before that. An
English mountaineer by name Sydney Wignall was deputed by Thimayya to
verify reports that the Chinese were building a road through Aksai
Chin. He was captured by the Chinese but released and made his way back
to India after incredible difficulties, surviving several snowstorms.
Now Thimayya had proof of Chinese incursion. When the Army presented
this to the Government, Menon blew up. In Nehru's presence, he told
the senior officer making the presentation that he was "lapping up CIA
propaganda."
Wignall was not Thimayya's only source. Shortly after the Chinese
attack in 1962, I heard from General Thimayya that he had deputed a
young officer of the Madras Sappers (MEG) to Aksai Chin to investigate
reports of Chinese intrusion who brought back reports of the Chinese
incursion. But the public was not told of it simply to cover up
Nehru's blunders. He was still trying to sell his Pancha Sheel and
Hindi-Chini Bhai Bhai to the Indian public. Even today, Nehru's
family members exercise dictatorial control over the documents
pertaining to this crucial period. Even documents in the National
Archives are not available to scholars without permission from the
Nehru-Gandhi family heirs. This is to protect his reputation from being
damaged by the truth.
The sorry catalog of blunders continued after Nehru's death. In the
Bangladesh war, India achieved one of the most decisive victories in
modern history. More than 90,000 Pakistani soldiers were in Indian
custody. The newly independent Bangladesh wanted to try these men as
war criminals for their atrocities against the people of East Bengal.
The Indian Government could have used this as a bargaining chip with
Pakistan and settled the Kashmir problem once and for all. Instead,
Indira Gandhi threw away this golden opportunity in exchange for a
scrap of paper called the Shimla Agreement. Thanks to this folly,
Pakistan is more active than ever in Kashmir.
Kargil and its lessons: brush with disaster
This sad string of failures holds an important lesson in history. The
Congress has always been a party held together by a personality -
first the Mahatma, later Nehru, and now Sonia Gandhi. It is inevitable
therefore that force of personality rather than concern of national
interest should have influenced major decisions even at crucial points
in history. This was so in Kashmir, in Tibet, over the border dispute
with China, the Shimla Agreement, and most recently, the misadventure
in Sri Lanka. It is India's misfortune that this personality
dominated entity should have controlled the fate of the nation for the
better part of half a century since independence. The question for the
future is - will history repeat itself or have the people of India
learnt their lesson. The Congress apparently has not. This is clear
from its behavior preceding the brief war with Pakistan over Kargil,
when Sonia Gandhi tried to takeover the Government in a coup under
false pretences.
It is unnecessary to go into the details of this sordid episode, but a
basic question needs to be asked. There are complaints all around that
Sonia Gandhi is destroying the Congress party because of her
inexperience and her style of functioning. But the same Congressmen
were willing to bring down the Government and install her as Prime
Minister - just as Pakistani soldiers were infiltrating across the
LOC in Kashmir. The question is - what would have been the fate of
Kashmir and India, had the coup attempt succeeded, with the immature
not to say irresponsible Sonia Gandhi in the place of Vajpayee as Prime
Minister, with the likes of Jayalalitha and Subramanian Swamy in
control? It does not take much intelligence to see that Kashmir would
have been lost, giving Sonia Gandhi an excellent excuse to declare
Emergency leading to dynastic dictatorship. This would bring back
European rule with a vengeance.
At the very least, the episode involving the infamous tea party and the
coup attempt showed that there are people at the highest level who have
no conception of national security. Anyone who indulges in such a
reckless adventure, treating the nation and its interests in such a
lighthearted manner is unfit for high office.
This is what India escaped in April 1999 - no thanks to the Congress
party. Nehru may no longer be on the scene but his legacy of
sacrificing national interest for personal gain - or what N.R.
Waradpande in a forthcoming book on Nehru has called 'assault on
nationhood' - continues unabated. By no stretch of the imagination
can the dynasty or its party be called nationalistic. The behavior of
the Congress party in mindlessly supporting Sonia Gandhi's coup
attempt at the cost of national interest shows both Nehru and his party
in their true colors.
Corruption of national institutions
As I just noted, even some documents in the National Archives are not
available to scholars if the Nehru family members feel that they might
contain any damaging information. But the Congress, joined by the
Communists, went much further, especially when Indira Gandhi became
Prime Minister. Just as Nehru sought control of the 'commanding heights
of the economy' with his socialistic planning, he and his successors
built a centralized educational establishment that would perpetuate his
anti-Hindu view of Indian history and civilization. This led to
anti-Hindu forces dominating education for nearly fifty years.
The first minister of education was Maulana Azad - said to be a
'nationalist' Muslim and a close friend and open admirer of Nehru -
at least in public. Azad was an indolent man and an ineffective
administrator, but with a strong commitment to exalting the glory of
Islamic rule in India. (He had also a hand in sabotaging R.C.
Majumdar's multi-volume work on the Indian Freedom Movement, which at
times was critical of the Congress.) So the official rewriting of
Indian history had begun - with its whitewashing of the horrors of
Islamic rule accompanied by the introduction of anti-Hindu propaganda
- describing Hinduism as full of inequities and Islam as egalitarian.
Nehru himself had set the trend with his glorification of Muhammad of
Ghazni and Babar.
Under this program of de-Hinduisation, vandals and terrorists like
Ghazni, Babar and Aurangazeb were treated as bringers of civilization
and equality, while portraying such freedom fighters as Shivaji, Rana
Pratap, Chandrashekar Azad and others as obstructionists standing in
the way of progress. But thanks to the official hospitality extended to
such historical revisions, the influential National Council for
Educational Research and Training (NCERT) came to be dominated by
scholars who pursued the Nehruvian agenda or were willing to cater to
it. The same was true of another influential educational body -
National Institute for Educational Planning and Administration (NIEPA).
Independent minded historians and other scholars who were not prepared
to toe this official line were removed or made ineffective.
A fateful event that played into the hands of the Secularists was the
appointment of Nurul Hassan as education minister in the Indira Gandhi
regime. He claimed to be a Marxist, but he pursued an anti-Hindu agenda
like a Muslim Fundamentalist. (After the creation of Pakistan, many
Muslim Fundamentalists pretended to be Marxists, and kept attacking
Hinduism for its 'inequality'.) As a result, anti-Hinduism acquired
a stranglehold on education. NIEPA is a particularly influential body
that administers and oversees educational policy in India. NCERT
controls textbooks and other materials that are used in schools and
colleges in India. Both were now under the firm control of anti-Hindu
forces.
Through his control of these two powerful bodies, Nurul Hassan became
education Czar in India. He extended patronage to the Marxist dominated
Jawaharlal Nehru University and Muslim separatist Aligarh Muslim
University. They were allowed to provide consultants and experts on all
educational matters. As a result, these two academically
undistinguished but politically opportunistic universities have come to
command resources and influence out of all proportion to their merit.
A single example should help give an idea of the dangers of this
centralized feudal educational policy. For over 20 years, H.S. Khan
headed the history and sociology division of the NCERT. He is known to
hold the view that India became civilized only through the introduction
of Islam. This incidentally is also the official Pakistani line. This
was also the view of Nurul Hassan who was of course the patron of H.S.
Khan. This is taking the Aryan invasion idea a giant step forward (or
backward).
In 1986, on Khan's initiative, textbook writers in all the states were
directed to change the version of history to accord with the anti-Hindu
model. Specific guidelines were issued to all the states instructing
them not to glorify any period of history - meaning any Hindu period
- as a Golden Age; the Gupta period therefore was not to be glorified
despite its great achievements. As a further step in de-Hinduisation
and rehabilitation of tyrannical Muslim rulers, Hindu leaders like
Shivaji, Chandrashekara Azad and Rana Pratap were not to be described
as freedom fighters against alien rule, but treated as terrorists who
opposed 'civilized and civilizing' rulers like Aurangazeb. As a result,
the anti-Hindu agenda, which had been gaining strength since the early
1950s, accelerated dramatically under the feudal regime of Nurul
Hassan. Only now, following the rout of the Congress party in the 1999
elections, their monopoly has come under threat. This has made these
men and women resort to desperate measures like what is coming out in
the ICHR scandals.
What should be done?
>>From all this two points become clear. First, the history being taught
in Indian schools and colleges was created by colonial masters and
their willing servants to serve anti-national interests and damage
India's heritage and culture. Second, institutions created to serve
national educational goals were dominated by self-serving individuals
who are hostile to national aspirations. The result is that
institutions like the ICHR fell into the hands of mediocre scholars
with political influence. They have contributed little of significance
because of their worship of the West and their inferiority complex.
They have built no Indian schools of thought, especially in history.
This had been foreseen by Sri Aurobindo long ago when he wrote:
"[That] Indian scholars have not been able to form themselves into a
great and independent school of learning is due to two causes: the
miserable scantiness of the mastery of Sanskrit provided by our
universities, crippling to all but born scholars, and our lack of
sturdy independence which makes us over-ready to defer to European [and
Western] authority."
There is another problem. In the fifty years after independence, the
Government and its agencies like the ICHR, NCERT and NIEPA have
supported only such scholars who are weak in scholarship and afraid of
thinking independently, but willing to toe the official line. They are
products of the Macaulayite education system, which was created to
produce colonial servants and not independent thinkers. When we look at
scholars doing independent work like Natwar Jha, David Frawley, R.C.
Majumdar, Shriakant Talageri, Sita Ram Goel and others, none of them
has received support from the Government. (I too have received no
support though I have worked closely with several distinguished
scholars including Jha and Frawley on important problems like the
decipherment of the Indus script.)
This shows that the Government has been supporting political favorites
rather than capable scholars. When we look at Government sponsored
scholars the picture is dismal. The only time anyone hears about them
is when there is a scandal or a political dispute like the ICHR
scandal. They have no important contributions that can be compared to,
say, the decipherment of the Indus Script. They are political
hangers-on rather than historians. They are able to get away with it
because of their monopoly hold over the establishment.
It is clear that a self-respecting nation like India cannot allow this
disgraceful state of affairs to continue. It cannot have its
children's education controlled by men and women with slavish minds
and a hostile attitude towards the nation and its history and culture.
The first step is to break the monopoly of these people, which has
already begun to happen to some extent. But this is only because there
is a Government in power that is more nationalistic in orientation than
previous Governments. A more permanent solution should be found so that
history and education are not subject to the whims of politicians and
special interests.
So both the causes and the consequences of this domination by
anti-national interests are clear. The question now is how to remedy
the situation? The first step would be to rewrite history books based
on the latest findings and the primary sources. But this is not enough,
for history can change as more discoveries are made. To ensure a
free-spirited inquiry and unfettered research, there should be no
Government organizations that tell educators and scholars how to write
and teach history. This means disbanding organizations like NIEPA and
NCERT. They have become little more than centers for thought control
and political propaganda. The ICHR should be reorganized strictly as a
funding agency that invites and funds proposals. For any major research
program, several scholars and/or groups of scholars should be funded so
that independent schools of thoughts can flourish. It should never be
allowed to become the monopoly of a single ideological advocacy group
as happened under the Congress regime.
But ultimately, the nation's education system should be changed to
encourage to independent and critical thinking. No subject or
personality should be placed beyond review and criticism. As Karl
Popper once observed: "If our civilization is to survive, we must break
with the habit of deference to great men. Great men make great
mistakes." This means that no one - be he Mahatma, Prophet or
anything else - can be put beyond the pale of review and criticism.
Popper of course was speaking in the context of the Western
Civilization. Indian sages have also expressed similar views. In his
Vishnu-tattva-vinirnaya, Sri Madhvacharya said:
"Never accept as authority the word of any human. Humans are subject to
error and deception. One deludes oneself in believing that there was a
man who was free of error and beyond deception, and he alone was the
author of any text."
And Bhagavan Buddha said: "Accept nothing on my authority. Think, and
be a lamp unto thyself."
This should be the guiding principle of education and intellectual
life.
Additional reading
This is only a brief summary of the distortions deliberately introduced
into Indian history, first by the British and then by their followers
in the Government and the intelligentsia. I have written this section
as a guide for readers who want to follow up on the topics discussed in
this essay. The literature on the subjects discussed in this essay is
huge, but I will point to a few easily available works.
On ancient India, there have been so many new discoveries that most
books written before 1985 or so are more or less obsolete. The book
Vedic Aryans and the Origins of Civilization by N.S. Rajaram and David
Frawley (Voice of India, New Delhi) gives a picture of Vedic India
based on primary sources and scientific evidence. The two volumes by
Shrikant Talageri, Aryan Invasion Theory, A Reappraisal and Rigveda-
A Historical Analysis (Aditya Prakashan, Delhi) provide a comprehensive
study of the Vedic and Puranic sources. The Myth of the Aryan Invasion
of India by David Frawley (Voice of India) is a popular account of the
subject. The Politics of History by N.S. Rajaram (Voice of India) is a
systematic study of the colonial and missionary background to the Aryan
invasion theory. Missionaries in India by Arun Shourie (Harper Collins,
New Delhi) discusses in detail the Christian missionary background to
the British colonial politics.
For a detailed discussion of the decipherment of the Indus script and
its ramifications see The Deciphered Indus Script by N. Jha and N.S.
Rajaram (Aditya Prakashan, Delhi). For a popular account of the new
picture of ancient India based on the latest discoveries including the
decipherment, see From Sarasvati River to the Indus Script by N.S.
Rajaram (Mitra Madhyama, Bangalore).
When we come to the medieval period, there is no single work that is
satisfactory. The most comprehensive account is the eight-volume
History of India as Told by Its Own Historians translated by Elliot and
Dowson, recently reissued by DK Publishers of Delhi. Several works by
K.S. Lal, including The Legacy of Muslim Rule in India, Twilight of the
Sultanate, Theory and Practice of Muslim State in India and Muslim
Slave System in Medieval India (Aditya Prakashan, Delhi) are highly
informative. Jihad: The Islamic Concept of Permanent War by Suhas
Majumdar (Voice of India) is a brilliant study of the subject. The best
source for understanding the ideology of Islam (and Jihad) and its
application in India is The Calcutta Quran Petition by Sita Ram Goel
(Voice of India, Delhi). Sita Ram Goel has also written the two-volume
Hindu Temples, What Happened to Them? (Voice of India), which is a
monumental compilation relating to the temples destroyed in Medieval
India. His book The Story of Islamic Imperialism in India (Voice of
India) is a highly readable summary. Voice of India has also published
several volumes on the Ayodhya dispute. See for example Profiles in
Deception: Ayodhya and the Dead Sea Scrolls by N.S. Rajaram (Voice of
India). See Negationism in India by Koenraad Elst (Voice of India) for
a brilliant account of the falsification of history by secularist
historians.
For the modern period also there are few satisfactory books that view
the freedom movement objectively. The best by far is the three-volume
History of the Freedom Movement in India by R.C. Majumdar (Firma-KLM,
Calcutta). The Tragic Story of Partition by H.V. Seshadri (Jagarana
Prakashan) is an excellent account of the Congress blunders that led to
the tragedy. Muslim Separatism, Causes and Consequences by Sita Ram
Goel (Voice of India) is a valuable summary of the same topic but with
some new insights. Gandhi, Khilafat and the National Movement by N.S.
Rajaram (Sahitya Sindhu, Bangalore) offers a revisionist view as well
as eyewitness accounts of the sadly neglected Mopla Rebellion. For the
betrayal of Tibet and the India-China relations, The Fate of Tibet by
Claude Arpi (Har-Anand, New Delhi) is the best source. India Betrayed:
Role of Nehru by Brigadier B.N. Sharma (Manas, New Delhi) is a valuable
source on the India-China relations including the border problem.
For a thorough expose of the corruption of national institutions, see
Eminent Historians by Arun Shourie (Harper-Collins, New Delhi) and also
Profiles in Deception by N.S. Rajaram (Voice of India, New Delhi).
On the subject of spirituality as the foundation of nationalism, there
are several works, from Sri Aurobindo and Swami Vivekananda to our own
times. A collection of essays on the Sri Aurobindo's sayings on
nationalism called India's Rebirth (Mira-Aditi Centre of Mysore) is
indispensable for understanding the spiritual foundation of
nationalism. These are further explored and expanded in A Hindu View of
the World by N.S. Rajaram (Voice of India, New Delhi). The two books by
David Frawley Arise Arjuna and Awaken Bharata (Voice of India, New
Delhi) expand on these themes as well as analyzing the contemporary
Indian scene.
