Motivations behind selecting the name 'India' in 1947

[Bang Galore]

I wish you had ruined an otherwise useful post by using the phrase pseudo secular. This is a piece of political jargon used by the Sangh Parivar as an offensive way of addressing the Congress and leftists.

Unfortunately, the guys at the Sangh Parivar are spot on about this one. Could not find something more apt than this. If you look at the seminal events of the last 30 years objectively, it is impossible not to call the policies of the Congess & the left anything but pseudo secular. The use of Brindanwale, the Shah Bano case, opening of the locks at Ayodhya cannot but be described as lunacy inspired by pseudo secular fantasies. The BJP's role in the Ayodhya issue was purely reactive, going far right of the Congess. knowing that it was a place where the Congress's communal pendulum did not reach. The Mandal issue was V.P. Singh's method of attemting to fragment the BJP's power base & the BJP's response was to attempt consolidation by upping the ante on the Ayodhya issue. The communists attempt to change demographics of the NE for vote bank politics is no less communal than what the BJP is accused of except that it also contained a streak of anti-nationalism within it. The Mulayam's, the Lalloo's & the Mayawathis are hardly paragons of secularism even if they are bestowed such accolades by either the left or the Congess. Who else? DMK?MQM? IUML? So who's secular?

 

[Bang Galore]

double post

 

[Joe Shearer]

Love it or hate it but Congress is pseudo secular, it doesn't eliminates religion from politics it just creates special priviliges for every religious group to appease them, thats not secularism. Congress thrives on religious differences because thats what mainly distinguishes them from BJP, you take that out and you can see BJP states have been doing equally good or better in terms of most of terms.

PS: Being an Atheist, I am not follower of Sangh pariwar or RSS, you are hurting my anti-religious sentiments by grouping me with them

Please go back and read my mail carefully. I do not deny that the Congress role in introducing religion into politics was negative; Jinnah commented on this nearly 80 years ago, around the time that Gandhi supported the Khilafat movement. Subsequently, their articulation of their view about India - Gandhi's view, elaborated by Nehru, and in a completely different, refreshing way by Maulana Azad - was dangerously wrong, and has created a lot of turbulence in independent India.

This does not justify another faction seizing on this cynical opportunism to be opportunistic in their turn. My only caution was not to use politically loaded language that labels you a BJP/Sangh Parivar supporter.

For a person neutral to religion as you have stated yourself to be, this is all the more important. This is precisely why, in spite of my cordial dislike of the Congress and its behaviour, I am personally scrupulously careful to stay neutral between these two abominable sets of people. Not to mention the third, the failed set, the Indian leftist.

One last word. Your anti-religious sentiments were hurt, you inform me. I am aware that you made this remark with tongue firmly in cheek. Your sense of humour gives us an opportunity to talk about this phrase and what it implies, so excuse my forceful remarks that follow.

You mentioned (with a grin) that your sentiments were hurt.

Tough luck, hombre. This is the totally phony excuse used, that somebody or the other felt hurt, that his sentiments were injured, to kill Sikhs by the hundreds in 84; it was used to kill Muslims and Christians in numerous incidents around the country, more times than one can count; it was used by armed gangs, not mobs, but cold-eyed assassination squads, bent on murder, groups of the upper castes to kill the scheduled castes, groups of the scheduled castes to kill the upper castes. Of all things that are rotten with our society and our politics, it is this business of sentiments being hurt. Sentiments being hurt does not justify violence; these should not have been hurt in the first place, we should not be wearing our deepest beliefs on our shirt-sleeves in the first place, these should be more robust and not so prone to wilt in direct sunshine or be water-logged in heavy dew.

Nothing is as abominable as this unmanly, soft in the head excuse that our sentiments are hurt. Avoid it, I suggest, even in jest.

 

[Joe Shearer]

Unfortunately, the guys at the Sangh Parivar are spot on about this one. Could not find something more apt than this. If you look at the seminal events of the last 30 years objectively, it is impossible not to call the policies of the Congess & the left anything but pseudo secular. The use of Brindanwale, the Shah Bano case, opening of the locks at Ayodhya cannot but be described as lunacy inspired by pseudo secular fantasies. The BJP's role in the Ayodhya issue was purely reactive, going far right of the Congess. knowing that it was a place where the Congress's communal pendulum did not reach. The Mandal issue was V.P. Singh's method of attemting to fragment the BJP's power base & the BJP's response was to attempt consolidation by upping the ante on the Ayodhya issue. The communists attempt to change demographics of the NE for vote bank politics is no less communal than what the BJP is accused of except that it also contained a streak of anti-nationalism within it. The Mulayam's, the Lalloo's & the Mayawathis are hardly paragons of secularism even if they are bestowed such accolades by either the left or the Congess. Who else? DMK?MQM? IUML? So who's secular?

@Bang Galore

The Sangh Parivar may (or may not) be spot on on this one; in another case, it could turn out that the Congress is, in yet another, it might be the left. Of the lot that you have mentioned in your post, while all are difficult to swallow for anybody with sensitivity and a thin skin, we have to be careful not be branded as one of any of these or to be associated with their egregious breaches of the law, and their flouting of the rule of the law.

You mentioned certain awful episodes and called them lunacy inspired by pseudo secular fantasies. On the contrary, these were not lunatic acts, these were acts of the worst cynicism and the most manipulative.

That still does not justify taking sides between them, and especially taking the side of those who have consistently, through the years, opposed this cynical opportunism with street violence, equally cynical subversion of the rule of law, and manipulation of the levers of power whenever they got hold of these.

You mention that none of the parties are really above the muck. We seem to be on the same page then.

Who else? you ask. So who's secular? you ask.

How about starting with you and I? We have control over what we feel and think, don't we?

Having honest politicians and a clean polity would have been priceless, and would have enabled us to move forward faster, better. However , if even with venal politicians and lack of accountability, we could go so far, we should try our best to protect our system and to improve it. Since our representatives betrayed us and took to crime, we now have to set things right - one millimetre at a time. And the millimetre I'm asking you and all right-minded liberal democrats for is this - let us not use what these animals have invented for their apparent opposition but concealed collusion and fall into the trap that they have so carefully prepared. Once we start taking sides, the game is up.

this one thing called democracy has kept us going and has forced politicians to listen to us, especially after T. N. Seshan freed the Election Commission and gave it some teeth. From that time onwards, there has been a clear belief in the India electorate that their vote, their single vote, makes a difference. Even if the parties are despicable today, they represent an alternative that we have given ourselves, which people are willing to die for in neighbouring countries.

Read PTH for a week or so, and you will get the picture. Pakistan would have soared effortlessly if they had not had a zombie around their shoulders for nearly half of the sixty years that they, with us, have been independent. Ask Yasser Hamdani; no, ask Raza Rumi, or AZW, or Bloody Civilian, or Tilsim. We have something priceless with us, and we keep dropping it and treating it with familiarity bordering on contempt.

Let us not be so cynical and condescending about democracy. Let us not please take it for granted. We are a beacon of hope in the middle of a desert; look west, look east, and you will see despair and doubt on all sides. Except possibly the brave Bangladeshis. Let us learn to count our blessings.

 

[roadrunner]

Ah, two for the price of one! And I thought that these bargains had stopped in Aladdin's time. Silly me.



Well, if studying a paper on the Persian War and the Peloponnesian War, and getting the highest marks in my year in that paper counts, I do know a wee bit, just a little bit, mind you, about Greek history.

Before we go further, may I remind you that I am able to guide you and others interested through each and every battle and skirmish of the Persian War, and of the Peloponnesian War, to an extent and depth of detail which you will not find in contemporary Internet sources. My personal favourite is the Battle of Plataia, which is less referred to than other, more famous but less interesting from the military point of view, others such as Marathon, Thermopilai and Salamis (all from the Persian War). It would be correct to come to me for help on obscure parts of the Anabasis, or on the same author's treatise on Horsemanship. I am therefore fascinated to learn from you how Herodotus and Megasthenes must be comparatively viewed, and how to interpret their records!

Up till this point, a lot of conceited self-praise. It doesn't mean anything

Your remark could only have been made by someone completely confused by trying to follow the train of his own logic through its tortured paths. Permit me to refresh your memory.

Herodotus (since I am writing for an amateur column, it is more convenient to use the conventional Roman spelling, which will be recognised more readily; the correct transcription of his name is, however, Herodotos) wrote about the Persian War. He probably died in the last quarter of the 5th century BC, sometime between 425 BC and 400 BC, probably closer to the beginning than to the end of this quarter-century. He was described by the Roman orator Cicero as the "Father of History". He was described by his successor, Thucydides (Thoukydides) as a story-teller.

I hope you in turn are aware that of the two, Thucydides is by far the better historian; I hope, in fact, that you have read either or both of them, in which case such suggestions on my part would not be necessary.

The better historian is a subjective opinion. Anyway, back to the point, Herodotus vs Megasthenes.

Herodotus did not visit "India", but he wrote about a place that he believed was India. It was actually Pakistan, and he called this place India. He may have got accounts from other travellers.

The point I'm trying to make here is that Herodotus was a very important Ancient Greek intellectual, much more so than Megasthenes. So the elite of Ancient Greece would have used his knowledge because of his pioneering ideas.

When the Ancient Greeks refer to India, they don't mean modern day India.

The question here is not of whom among Herodotus and Megasthenes was considered the more important figure in the Ancient Greek hierarchy. Leaving aside the fact that there was actually no hierarchy, you are of course writing what you did with the full knowledge that one of them wrote, sitting in Greece, in the first half of the fifth century BC, sometime between 450 and 425 BC, and the other wrote after his ambassadorship to the places in question which was before 288 BC but not too far before.

I put it to you that the question is not of a mythical, manufactured hierarchy invented for the purposes of this argument by you, but of whether a remote look at a geography by an historian is of more weight than the accounts, the diplomatic report, to nod in the direction of Wikileaks, as it were, of an ambassador physically present in his reported location.


I am afraid that I have to correct you on this: he was actually at the capital, Pataliputra, which he spells quite recognisably as Patlibothra, not at the provincial seat, Taxila, which was in revolt more than once.

Quite a few people think Megasthenes was Ambassador at Taxila. There's quite a bit of evidence for it. But even if it was Patna, I've accounted for this, and given you a best or worst case scenario.

 

[LaBong]

Quite a few people think Megasthenes was Ambassador at Taxila. There's quite a bit of evidence for it. But even if it was Patna, I've accounted for this, and given you a best or worst case scenario.

Not sure if terms like Quite a few and quite a bit have any place in the discussion that is going on here. Let us not use generic terms when discussing history.

 

[Pagla Dashu]

Unfortunately, the guys at the Sangh Parivar are spot on about this one. Could not find something more apt than this. If you look at the seminal events of the last 30 years objectively, it is impossible not to call the policies of the Congess & the left anything but pseudo secular. The use of Brindanwale, the Shah Bano case, opening of the locks at Ayodhya cannot but be described as lunacy inspired by pseudo secular fantasies. The BJP's role in the Ayodhya issue was purely reactive, going far right of the Congess. knowing that it was a place where the Congress's communal pendulum did not reach. The Mandal issue was V.P. Singh's method of attemting to fragment the BJP's power base & the BJP's response was to attempt consolidation by upping the ante on the Ayodhya issue. The communists attempt to change demographics of the NE for vote bank politics is no less communal than what the BJP is accused of except that it also contained a streak of anti-nationalism within it. The Mulayam's, the Lalloo's & the Mayawathis are hardly paragons of secularism even if they are bestowed such accolades by either the left or the Congess. Who else? DMK?MQM? IUML? So who's secular?

Bangalorejee, your case is watertight. You don't have to go too far to highlight these hypocrisies. Just look at what Digvijay Singh is doing. Shamelessly playing sectarian politics using an Indian hero of 26/11.

But I personally would like to use the term 'hypocrites' to describe these political entities/personalities. 'Pseudo-secular' is an out and out political term, coined by the Sanghis to exclusively reflect a particular brand of politics and by using this term we would be unwittingly playing right into their hands.

I think I would go with Joe this time around.

PS: Lets not deviate too much from the fascinating topic about the term 'India'.

 

[Joe Shearer]

Up till this point, a lot of conceited self-praise. It doesn't mean anything

No, nothing at all, if you wish it not to mean anything.

You perhaps are aware that debates and logical argument, in public, with moderators, sometimes without, was a way of life in intellectual circles in those benighted locations that you have a fixed idea about. In all of these, it was customary to commence by establishing one's credentials and one's fitness to enter into conversation of this nature.

Just to complete it, my guru parampara is Kuruvilla Zachariah, Susobhan Sarkar, and Ashin DasGupta. What, pray, is yours?

I have put my record on line, for whatever it is worth. Is it that you have nothing to put up in your turn, and so feel that this is all conceited self-praise?

Those who are older members of PDF will be aware that this is a periodic exercise for you, and that you have been through this cycle three years ago when you first joined. If my memory serves right, you mentioned that your post (on a parallel subject) was your first. What are you trying to do, check to see if facts change every three to five years? Much of what we are saying has been said three years ago. Remember?

The better historian is a subjective opinion. Anyway, back to the point, Herodotus vs Megasthenes.

It depends on whose opinion we have to consider. Between your opinion and Thucydides, I prefer Thucydides. No doubt because I am prejudiced by an excessive exposure to history, and cannot bring to it the fresh, uncluttered approach that you do.

Herodotus did not visit "India", but he wrote about a place that he believed was India. It was actually Pakistan, and he called this place India. He may have got accounts from other travellers.

The point I'm trying to make here is that Herodotus was a very important Ancient Greek intellectual, much more so than Megasthenes. So the elite of Ancient Greece would have used his knowledge because of his pioneering ideas.

Perhaps our idea of the elite is slightly different. My idea is of an intellectual elite, an elite capable of realising the difference between a desktop account, based on "accounts from other travellers", and a personal, first-hand account of an important dignitary who was familiar with the territory, living, as he did, as the house-guest of a border province governor.

The elite of Ancient Greece, I can assure you, knew the difference. They would have used pioneering ideas in philosophy, not in fact-based disciplines such as history and geography. Not for nothing was the Periplus of the Erythraean Sea so popular, considered - and rightly so - a far more accurate account of the lands and places listed than Herodotus. This in spite of the fact that it was an anonymous account, rather than one penned from second, third and worse hand accounts by the illustrious Herodotus.

The Ancient Greeks were not the imbeciles you make them out to be.

When the Ancient Greeks refer to India, they don't mean modern day India.

Don't look now, but you have mentioned it, in passing, about a couple of hundred times before. It is unlikely that anyone will burst into tears on the, say, 300th repetition, and totter away, leaving you beating your manly breast in the arena, victor over all comers. It isn't that kind of competition. Ask the Ancient Greeks if you aren't sure.

Also, I did say what I could about Megasthenes, apparently to little or no avail. Pity. Man wrote well, and in detail, about things that he knew first-hand.

Quite a few people think Megasthenes was Ambassador at Taxila. There's quite a bit of evidence for it. But even if it was Patna, I've accounted for this, and given you a best or worst case scenario.

Quite a few people think that all known Indo-European languages originated in India, and travelled out to all parts of the world. There are kooks everywhere. There is, on the other hand, an historical consensus, a general sense by most historians on what is the most likely, and it is better to stick to that.

If you take to quoting lunatic fringe writers of your choice, you do realise that it will open you to the unwelcome attentions of the zombies who abound who specialise in lunatic fringe writers of their own. I won't be around to protect you, having hurled myself off the Acropolis to take my place in the shades with the Ancient Greek elite.

Before this gets under your skin, could I sincerely suggest knitting as a pastime? It is so soothing and - how do I put it? - tangle-free.

 

[shuntmaster]

Herodotus did not visit "India", but he wrote about a place that he believed was India. It was actually Pakistan, and he called this place India. He may have got accounts from other travellers.


When the Ancient Greeks refer to India, they don't mean modern day India.

Maybe Herodotus made that big mistake, because he had never heard of the word 'Pakistan'.

Quite a few people think Megasthenes was Ambassador at Taxila. There's quite a bit of evidence for it. But even if it was Patna, I've accounted for this, and given you a best or worst case scenario.

Takshashila was only a university during Megasthenes time and Pataliputra (Patna) was the capital of the Nanda/Maurayan empire, which included 'ancient Pakistan', when Megastenes was their ambassador. Why would he be based in a university town instead of the capital city?

 

[Rafi]

It is indeed awe inspiring to note the effect Ancient Pakistan had on the development of civilization.

 

[Joe Shearer]

It is indeed awe inspiring to note the effect Ancient Pakistan had on the development of civilization.

It is, indeed.

From your comment, you are sensitive to culture and to aspects of civilisation. I am sure that you will enjoy seeing the excavation site of Troy, a contribution, as you well know, of Ancient Turkey to civilisation, or to the ruins of the great cities of Asia Minor, the cave cities of Cappadocia, for example, more contributions of Ancient Turkey. It is irrelevant that there were no Turks there in those; they still happen to be Ancient Turkey, because the sites are today in Turkey, and they were constructed in Ancient times, so its simple arithmetic really, no big deal, Ancient + Turkey = Ancient Turkey.

If your preference is for greater antiquity, you might want to examine the ruins of Sumer, of Assyria, of Babylon, all remnants of Ancient Iraq, not to mention the discoveries at the sites of Dilmun, clearly and visibly Ancient Bahrain. Further out, you will find the ancient statue of the Pharaoh Taharqa deep in southern Sudan, a relic of the Pharaonic culture and civilisation of Ancient Sudan. Or you might like to swing further west, across the desert, and visit the ruins of Leptis Magna, part of the great civilisation spanning the Mediterranean and running along present-day Germany, Austria, Hungary and the Danube, the great empire of Ancient Tunis.

Something transatlantic can be worked out, and you can go and visit the signs of Ancient Greenland, and wonder how they spanned the entire Atlantic, dominated the entire seaboard of an entire continent in their dragon boats, and finally put down permanent settlements in Normandy, in England, even in Sicily.

Or you might want to come down places nearer us, and check out the intriguing and mysterious mummies around the Tien Shan mountains, all Tocharian remnants of Ancient Xinjiang. Some delicacy and caution is advised, because not all all-weather friendships might survive these cultural cross-currents; after all, as the Kushanas, these same mummies belong to the race already claimed by Ancient Pakistan. I am sure something can be worked out.

I am happy to inform you that a veritable feast awaits your eagerly waiting mind and heart. Good luck and bon voyage. Do let us know when you return, so that we may gather around a campfire to hear your traveller's tales, and how there are men with one leg, and others who sleep under the shade of their own ears. And don't forget the foxes who harvest gold for their masters, or our mentor in this thread might get very, very annoyed at our ignoring the no 1 in the international ratings, the holder of the highest TRPs, the highest history ELO rating holder - wait for it - the one and only, the unmatched, the peerless, the one who knew more than others after him or those on the spot - Ancient H. We couldn't have that, could we?

PS: Silly me! I forgot to tell you about Ancient Hashemite Jordan with its cities in the desert, which proves that the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, which has been such a good friend of Pakistan through the decades past, was an even greater friend of Pakistan when both of them were ancient. As you remember, I am sure, the Nabataeans, who built and ran the cities, Petra, for instance, were the original masters of the trade with Pakistan, right down to Muziris.

 

[ironman]

^^^ Well, Joe that was like..

youtube.com/watch?v=fTyIKnRQdx0

Show some mercy.

 

[Joe Shearer]

^^^ Well, Joe that was like..

youtube.com/watch?v=fTyIKnRQdx0

Show some mercy.

Why?

Do you think my post was inappropriately violent? Should I have toned it down a bit, perhaps?

Maybe if I changed everything from Ancient to Mediaeval, it might sound more cheerful?

It's all a hideous misunderstanding.

 

[Rafi]

It is, indeed.

From your comment, you are sensitive to culture and to aspects of civilisation. I am sure that you will enjoy seeing the excavation site of Troy, a contribution, as you well know, of Ancient Turkey to civilisation, or to the ruins of the great cities of Asia Minor, the cave cities of Cappadocia, for example, more contributions of Ancient Turkey. It is irrelevant that there were no Turks there in those; they still happen to be Ancient Turkey, because the sites are today in Turkey, and they were constructed in Ancient times, so its simple arithmetic really, no big deal, Ancient + Turkey = Ancient Turkey.

If your preference is for greater antiquity, you might want to examine the ruins of Sumer, of Assyria, of Babylon, all remnants of Ancient Iraq, not to mention the discoveries at the sites of Dilmun, clearly and visibly Ancient Bahrain. Further out, you will find the ancient statue of the Pharaoh Taharqa deep in southern Sudan, a relic of the Pharaonic culture and civilisation of Ancient Sudan. Or you might like to swing further west, across the desert, and visit the ruins of Leptis Magna, part of the great civilisation spanning the Mediterranean and running along present-day Germany, Austria, Hungary and the Danube, the great empire of Ancient Tunis.

Something transatlantic can be worked out, and you can go and visit the signs of Ancient Greenland, and wonder how they spanned the entire Atlantic, dominated the entire seaboard of an entire continent in their dragon boats, and finally put down permanent settlements in Normandy, in England, even in Sicily.

Or you might want to come down places nearer us, and check out the intriguing and mysterious mummies around the Tien Shan mountains, all Tocharian remnants of Ancient Xinjiang. Some delicacy and caution is advised, because not all all-weather friendships might survive these cultural cross-currents; after all, as the Kushanas, these same mummies belong to the race already claimed by Ancient Pakistan. I am sure something can be worked out.

I am happy to inform you that a veritable feast awaits your eagerly waiting mind and heart. Good luck and bon voyage. Do let us know when you return, so that we may gather around a campfire to hear your traveller's tales, and how there are men with one leg, and others who sleep under the shade of their own ears. And don't forget the foxes who harvest gold for their masters, or our mentor in this thread might get very, very annoyed at our ignoring the no 1 in the international ratings, the holder of the highest TRPs, the highest history ELO rating holder - wait for it - the one and only, the unmatched, the peerless, the one who knew more than others after him or those on the spot - Ancient H. We couldn't have that, could we?

PS: Silly me! I forgot to tell you about Ancient Hashemite Jordan with its cities in the desert, which proves that the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, which has been such a good friend of Pakistan through the decades past, was an even greater friend of Pakistan when both of them were ancient. As you remember, I am sure, the Nabataeans, who built and ran the cities, Petra, for instance, were the original masters of the trade with Pakistan, right down to Muziris.

Why, thank you Joe, it is indeed marvellous to see what the Ancient Pakistanis - ie the people of the Indus - achieved, and the more than 5,000 years of continual civilization.

And we Pakistanis are sons of our soil, what we find very fascinating is our eastern neighbours attempt to co-opt our historical heritage. It being obvious that the modern state of india - has the exclusive heritage of bharat, which is the heritage of todays india.

 

[Rafi]

Our forefathers have shown their greatness - and the uniqueness of the people and culture of the Indus Valley, from the rest of the so-called Sub-Continent - clearly show that in one form or another, Pakistan has been a de facto reality back to time immemorial.