The question of nationhood of India

Quite often I encounter people who say that India was never a nation.. It's amusing to see their deep love of a divided Bharat.

I must reply them, that their knowledge of nationhood is quite narrow. I'm sorry to say, but there can be different basis of nationhood in different regions. In Europe nationhood was derived from ethnicity or linguistic basis, in middle East basis of nationhood was religious (Islamic caliphate) and in East, South Asia onwards, the basis of nationality was civilizational. In Vishnu Purana which is not some recent text Bharat is defined as उत्तरं यत्समुद्रस्य हिमाद्रेश्चैव दक्षिणम् ।

  वर्षं तद् भारतं नाम भारती यत्र संततिः

ie, “The country (Varsam) that lies north of the ocean and south of the snowy mountains is called Bharatam; there dwell the descendants of Bharata" people, despite the absence of a political unity in the administration of India, used to roam freely without having a feeling of being in some other foreign land.

For a very long time India has been a civilizational federal entity where all the identities have a common set of ethos with a few differences here and there. This entire land from Himalaya to Kanyakumari and from Gandhar in the West to Sri Vijaya in the East was a venerated with a chain of holy places, which establishes the holiness of this land for people thriving here, and thus forms the basis of a unique form of nationhood for all the people living here without necessary political unification.

Unfortunately there is a sizeable chunk of people present in our bureaucracy and political circles, who believe the Nehruvian elitist separatist idea of "nation in making" nonsense.

Those who try to deny the nationhood of India, are a security threat, and a civilizational threat in long run.

Thanks for reading. Subscribe to my blog by clicking sidebar icon and entering email on the top left corner of the main menu (where all the articles are listed)