India’s colonial heritage is one of the oldest and most sustained in the world. Even identifying its substance and contours has baffled the greatest minds of India. In recent years, India has taken symbolic steps towards removing vestiges of colonial rule, but much work remains. Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s call to remove the colonial mindset from India is a step of immense significance with a tantalizing potential agenda. India needs to translate this call into concrete actions that course through educational programs and public discourse.
The Restoration
of Kshatriya Traditions of Valour
The
installation of Subhas Bose’s statue at India Gate symbolizes the restoration
of Bharat’s ancient Kshatriya traditions of valour, a potent example of
decolonization. It abandons the penchant for appeasement and self-harm that
prompted the colonialists to describe its chief protagonist as the best
policeman they ever had in India.
Replacing
Vestiges of Colonial Rule
India has taken
several symbolic steps to replace obvious vestiges of colonial rule. The
splendid idea of changing India’s naval ensign to reflect the glory of India’s
iconic military hero and merging the flame of the National War Memorial with
Amar Jawan Jyoti to renaming major thoroughfares and the installation of Subhas
Chandra Bose’s statue at India Gate.
The
Significance of NEP-2020
The
significance of the NEP-2020 affirmation of mother language teaching cannot be
underestimated, nor can the repealing of 1,500 colonial-era laws burdening
judicial attention. Many other instances of eschewing the colonial mindset have
been implemented, and the next obvious step would be renaming India as Bharat.
The Goriest
Manifestations of India’s Tortured Colonial Past
The goriest
manifestations of India’s tortured colonial past are the product of hundreds of
years of genocidal Islamic rule that meant grim desolation, abduction, and
slavery that altered everything that was sacred in the traditions of Santana
Dharma. The basis of Hindu learning, its revered teachers, were decimated on a
massive scale, and temples systematically destroyed. Hindu women were turned
into pitiful concubines on an unimaginable scale, and the largest group of
slaves in Central Asia was known to have been Hindus.
The Continuing
Degradation of Women in India
One of the most
disturbing legacies of this first Islamic colonial incursion is the continuing
degradation of women in India, once worshipped as deities to whom even supreme
male deities paid obeisance. Unfortunately, the uninterrupted colonial mindset
response to the tragedy of Hindu women, in a still corrupted Hindu
civilization, ended up heaping insult upon injury. It adopted supposed legal
resolutions from the subsequent British colonial tradition itself without
reflecting on the much deeper issues involved. There can be no liberation from
the colonial mindset until Durga, Saraswati, and Lakshmi rule the hearts and
minds of India.
Conclusion
Prime Minister
Narendra Modi’s call to remove the colonial mindset from India is a step of
immense significance with a tantalizing potential agenda. India has taken
symbolic steps to remove vestiges of colonial rule, but much work remains.
India’s colonial heritage has evolved over a long period of millennia and with
sustained intensity. It is important to translate the Prime Minister’s stirring
call into concrete acts that course through educational programs and public
discourse. India needs to rid itself of the colonial mindset and restore its
ancient traditions of valour and respect for women. The process of
decolonization is long and complex, but it is necessary to ensure India’s
future growth and success.
