A warped hash that fans the embers of old imperial verities, this is the story of India fit for a philistine
Our Bombay boy-turned-British peer believes, apparently seriously, that India began to experience nationhood only after Vasco da Gama brought the enlightened West to our benighted land, that 바카라India is a creature of the 150 years since 1857바카라, and that 바카라there was no Indian nation before then바카라. Moreover that, but for the British, independent India would never have discovered unity or democracy not only since we would not have been introduced to Bentham or ruled by Bentinck but also because India has had the good fortune of emerging as 바카라a creature of global capitalism harnessed to the winner country바카라. Indeed, even the Mahatma바카라s contribution to contemporary nation-building is attributed to Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi having been 바카라an England-trained barrister바카라.
Jawaharlal Nehru바카라s 바카라myth바카라 of an Indian nation is dismissed by Lord Desai as a devious Congress device to establish its 바카라hegemony바카라 over the freedom movement. Indeed, my noble lord concludes that it is not us poor Indians but 바카라Pakistan바카라 that has 바카라cemented India바카라.
Not only Nehru, Gandhi too is not spared for having committed the outrage of squelching Ramsay MacDonald바카라s Communal Award of 1932, which would have given Dalits 72 seats from separate electorates, by the Mahatma offering them 142 through reservation. 바카라Alas,바카라 he says, the Congress portrayed the Award as 바카라another 바카라divide and rule바카라 ploy바카라 (it wasn바카라t?!) and the native rascals got away with keeping the Dalits within the Hindu fold. Wah re mere Gujju bhai, you are not only Queen Elizabeth바카라s faithful servant, you have outdone Abdul Karim in your fidelity to Queen Victoria!
Nehru바카라s Discovery of India begins with his asking those who greet him on his 1937 election tour with the slogan 바카라Bharat mata ki jai바카라 the identity and meaning of this Bharat mata. And the book is a search for the essence of the millennial belief that Bharat is mata because the mother belongs to all of us who through 바카라the trackless centuries바카라 have believed that our being children of a common motherland is what makes us a nation. Nehru articulated India바카라s unique combination of antiquity and continuity with heterogeneity in the evolution of our nationhood바카라a civilisation that seeks unity not through uniformity, but unity through diversity, synthesising all races, colours and religions, numerous languages and thousands of dialects, and a bouquet of customs and traditions into a single Indian nation. Perhaps his Lordship바카라s long years in salubrious foreign lands (for he fled his country of birth as a callow lad of twenty-one) have made Desai forget the sankalp, invoked over at least five thousand years, that places the Indian worshipper in 바카라Bharata-varshe바카라.
The book바카라s second half, about India after independence, is trite, superficial and riddled with inaccuracies, inconsistencies and omissions. He cannot even get right the sequencing of 26/11, for he places the attack on the Taj before the outrage at the CST and the Cama Hospital (and fails to mention the Trident, presumably because it lacks his preference for a 바카라haven of luxury바카라). As for inconsistencies, he claims 바카라economic policy was the biggest failure of Nehru바카라 and, in the very next paragraph, begins, 바카라Nehru himself was witness to a good decade of growth in India바카라. And as for omissions, he gives us a potted, patchy history of Rajiv Gandhi as PM without mentioning either panchayati raj, the action plan for a nuclear-weapons-free and non-violent world order, or his championing (against Thatcher바카라s machinations) of an end to apartheid, colonialism and invasion in Africa, which led to Rajiv being invited as the principal guest at Namibia바카라s independence day celebrations even after ceasing to be prime minister.
Strange how a coloured immigrant has to twist and turn to become a peer of the realm. And, shame on us, we바카라ve given not only Chatwal but even this guy a Bharatiya Pravasiya Puraskar.