Romila Thapar’s “tunnel view” of Indian History

The renowned and much feted historian of yesteryears , Romila Thapar, has published a new book of “essays and reflections”. And today’s The Hindu (18 June 2023) carries in its prominent column a very interesting interview conducted with her by way of promoting and endorsing the book. I reproduce the interview below in extenso.

After reading the entire interview I for one immediately could get a pretty good idea of what Thapar’s essays in her book would all be about. I shall of course buy a copy of the book soon and read it, but meanwhile, based on my reading of this recent interview with her, my overarching impression is that despite the vaulting scholarship Romila Thapar, historian-emeritus of Nehruvian India, is renowned for, she suffers a fatal flaw. It is her preponderant perspective of India’s history which, in my opinion, suffers from “tunnel view”. Here I don’t hesitate to confess I am not a historian but merely an ordinary student of the history taught to me back in school and university but which still serves me quite well, thank you.

I will certainly explain why after reading her prolix answers, I think Thapar’s view is tunnel. But first the reader must patiently and thoroughly read her entire The Hindu interview . So, please do so and then when you have finished, kindly scroll all the way down to the end of it, continuing on even further to read my very own take on the theme that Thapar has talked about.

Sudarshan Madabushi

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“The Hindu” interview:

Romila Thapar on how the politics of the present seeks legitimacy from a constructed history to the exclusion of others:

Romila Thapar is one of the best known critics of Hindutva politics. Often criticised by the right wing for her independent views, Thapar still raises her voice for a pluralist India. Her new book, The Future in the Past, is a collection of essays on issues and ideas that have preoccupied her as a historian. In a conversation, Thapar explains how Hindutva politics seeks legitimacy from a supposedly Hindu past to the exclusion of others. Excerpts:

How do you look at the Hindutva approach to history?

An approach to history usually involves a theory of explanation. This means gathering reliable evidence on the subject to be researched, which is then analyzed, and a logical explanation sought for past events. None of this is required for the Hindutva approach to history which is largely the description of a past so constructed that it provides legitimacy for an ideology of present times. There is no check on whether the evidence is reliable and the explanation based on well-reasoned arguments. Professional historians therefore do not take it seriously.

The purpose of Hindutva history is to maintain that the proposed Hindu Rashtra is the predictable outcome of the past of India. The focus is on the history of Hindus thought to be the most relevant compared to others. Recent deletions in the history textbooks such as Mughal history are a case in point. Contributions to the past came from varying sources, but for Hindutva only the past of Hindu communities is of any real consequence. For Hindutva, current politics should be conducive to bring about a Hindu Rashtra.

Modern scientific achievements are said to have been known millennia ago to learned Hindus — an idea that gives rise inevitably to incredible claims, such as the antiquity of flying machines, plastic surgery being used literally to create the deity Ganesh, or stem-cell research in the birth of the Kauravas. None of these claims is based on proven evidence. It underlines the difference between trained historians and those claiming to be writing history. 

Why does a section of academia and a significant section of politicians have this urge to own the Aryans and emphasise their alleged indigenous origin?

In pre-colonial times the term arya was applied to those whose language evolved from the Aryan language and who were socially worthy of respect. The king is sometimes called arya-putra. In the culture of the Iranian Aryans in ancient Iran, the Achaemenid rulers took pride in identifying themselves as Aryas and as Aryan speakers. Culturally, the Iranian Avesta shows some curious links with the Rigveda.

In the 19th century the term ‘race’ came into prominence and the study of peoples around the world was labelled ‘race-science’. Dividing people into races introduced a hierarchy, and in this the Aryans were placed high. It was taken to a horrific extreme by Hitler and the Nazis supported by Mussolini and the Italian fascists. Indians linked to Hindutva such as B.S. Moonje, were deeply impressed and aimed to model their own organisations on these lines. Added to this was colonial scholarship that regarded the Aryans as superior. 

In the Indian context, the Celtic culture of the British Isles was thought to have some similarities with Indo-Aryan cultures. The speakers of the Indo-Aryan language, Sanskrit, were projected as the original Hindus and their religion, Vedic Brahmanism, was foundational to Hinduism. 

Savarkar defined the Hindu as the one who could claim that India was the land of his ancestors, pitribhumi, and was also where his religion originated, punyabhumi. The Aryans therefore have to have originated within India. Hence the desperate search for an Indian homeland of the Aryans, and the Hindutva denial of migrations into India from Central Asia by Aryan-speaking peoples.

The creation of a national culture was anti-colonial in nature. How has it devolved into the concept of Hindu Rashtra today? 

Historically there have been two categories of nationalism in India. The earlier one which was much bigger, more inclusive, and that had the support of the majority of Indians, across all communities, was what has been called — and rightly — the nationalism of the Indian National Movement, seeded in the late 19th century. As a movement it was inclusive and drew in every Indian, irrespective of other identities such as religion, language, class or caste. It had one main purpose which was to end colonial rule and convert India into a free, independent nation-state. I would call this as inclusive, integrated nationalism. A nation-state was achieved in 1947. The essential characteristics of this nationalism were democracy and secularism that would help to ensure the equality of all citizens. 

Alongside this integrated nationalism was another movement that has been called religious nationalism. In the late 1920s and early 1930s, two movements began to take shape. They called themselves nationalisms but were based on limited majorities and qualified by a single religious identity. The Hindu identity was the religious majority of the population, and the Muslim identity was in religious terms, the largest minority in India. Neither of these two was centrally concerned about organising against colonial power. Each of the two planned to establish two successor states after the departure of the coloniser. One was Pakistan which would cater to the Muslim majority among the minority communities, and the other was the Hindu Rashtra that would cater to the Hindu majority in the population. 

How did this come about?

Their genesis lay in the colonial reading of the Indian past. Colonial scholars argued that pre-modern Indians lacked a sense of history as there were no histories of India dating to pre-British times. So they set about investigating India and came up with the theory that there had been two religious ‘nations’ — the Hindu and the Muslim — that had dominated history, and had been deeply hostile to each other. The manifestation of this theory took shape in the various parties supporting the two nationalisms qualified by religion — such as the Muslim League supporting Muslim nationalism, and the Hindu Mahasabha, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh etc. supporting Hindu nationalism. The chickens of colonialism came home to roost in these religious nationalisms.

In contrast to inclusive, integrated nationalism, religious nationalism is defined by its being exclusive and segregating, concerning itself with the well-being of largely only those who identify with its religious identity, or for that matter any other single identity of either language or caste. 

Religious nationalism is a party of co-religionists. Because it is exclusive it segregates itself from other nationalisms, and to that extent can be appropriately called segregated nationalism. Its central purpose is to establish a nation-state for the well-being of those belonging to a single signified religion, generally the religion of the demographic majority, as in the case of Hindu nationalism. This severely contradicts two essential characteristics of the nation-state — that it must be democratic and secular in its functioning. In the absence of this functioning, the mutation of such states into political authoritarianism is always feared. 

Is the modern concept of nationalism a ruse for politics of exclusion?

It depends on which kind of nationalism one is speaking of. It is important to make a distinction between integrated nationalism and segregated nationalism. As long as integrated nationalism prevails there is unity of purpose, as there was in India initially after 1947. We were then concerned with building a society ensuring the welfare of all and took at least a few steps to do so. It wasn’t just a matter of making speeches for electoral support and leaving it at that. After all, we do have a Constitution to guide us in what we might be doing or planning. Integrated nationalism does not make a distinction between ‘we’ and ‘they’ since every citizen is included. But segregated nationalism does make a distinction, giving priority and privileges to the ‘we’ and subordinating the ‘they’. Sometimes it is even a violent subordination to press home the difference between the dominant majority and the lesser others. This does not happen in integrated nationalism because the majority in this form has people of mixed qualifications. In this the composition of the majority is not permanent and based on a single identity as it can change when the subject of discussion changes. 

“The Future in the Past: Essays & Reflections“; Romila Thapar, Aleph, ₹999.

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Now here below is my reason why I opine that Romila Thapar’s responses in the interview to THE HINDU above reveal her tunnel view of Indian history.

1. In the entire review, I cannot find a single reference to the word “CIVILIZATION“. Not once will you find that word being used! And such omission is a grievous and pretty telling giveaway of any historian’s worldview. Ms.Thapar uses the words “nationalism“, “religion”, “history”, “identity” and “majority” several times during the interview but not even once are they used in the larger, more vaulting context of Civilization or of India’s Civilization. To my mind, this single but significant omission on her part clearly exposes — in the sense of, let’s say, a Freudian slip — her tunnel vision as a historian. For a historian to hold forth on History without as much as even a passing reference to Civilization is a dead giveaway about his or her fundamental flaw of character viz.: an egregious lack respect for the true spirit of historiography.
2. The historian Samuel Huntington in his most well-known work “THE CLASH OF CIVILIZATIONS” (1996) began his book with these stellar words: “Human history is the history of civilizations. It is impossible to think of the development of humanity in any other terms”. Applying this Huntington principle to the study of all of the history of India, no historian can ever ignore that there exists a thing called “the civilization of India“. And Thapar blithely ignores it.
3. Thapar’s plaintive cry is that (quote): “The focus is on the history of Hindus thought to be the most relevant compared to others”. (unquote). Her principal objection to the way many young, post-Nehruvian historians of the present day write or are re-writing the history of India is that they think “only the past of Hindu communities is of any real consequence”. She therefore concludes that this “approach to history is largely the description of a past so constructed that it provides legitimacy for an ideology of present times”.
4. From that starting-point, Thapar goes on to make her main argument viz.: Indian history to be properly understood must be explained only in terms of Nationalism. She says: “Historically there have been two categories of nationalism in India…. ” “integrated nationalism” and “religious nationalism“.
5. Then defining both Nationalisms she goes on to say, that the essential characteristics of “integrated nationalism … (are) democracy and secularism that would help to ensure the equality of all citizens”. And “religious nationalism” is “based on limited majorities and qualified by a single religious identity… the Hindu identity… (being the) religious majority of the population.”
6. Thapar is of the view that Indian History must be viewed (and written) looking through the prism of what she calls “integrated nationalism” and not “religious nationalism“. Why? We may ask. And why not the latter rather than the former? Thapar provides here the answer in the following words… Clearly they are not that of an objective historian but a polemicist for a dogma:
7. “In contrast to inclusive, integrated nationalism, religious nationalism is defined by its being exclusive and segregating, concerning itself with the well-being of largely only those who identify with its religious identity, or for that matter any other single identity of either language or caste. Religious nationalism is a party of co-religionists. Because it is exclusive it segregates itself from other nationalisms, and to that extent can be appropriately called segregated nationalism. Its central purpose is to establish a nation-state for the well-being of those belonging to a single signified religion, generally the religion of the demographic majority, as in the case of Hindu nationalism. This severely contradicts two essential characteristics of the nation-state — that it must be democratic and secular in its functioning. In the absence of this functioning, the mutation of such states into political authoritarianism is always feared. 
8. For Romila Thapar, the History of India written and explained in terms of “religious nationalism” (aka “Hindutva”) is anathema because Religion itself is anathema. The Thapar gold standard for historiography is another pseudo-religion called “Secularism“. Therefore, in her dictionary “Religion” and “Democracy” are mutually exclusive terms and ideas… A religious society cannot be a democratic one and vice versa. And a nation that identifies itself with “religious nationalism” must by definition be ruled only by “political authoritarianism”. To Thapar it is inconceivable that a Hindu Rashtra can mean or be anything other than “a Hindu-only Rashtra“.
9. The convoluted logic by which Thapar makes her above case and arrives at a conclusion borders truly on arrant non-sequitur. However her reasoning and conclusions are a matter for maybe only professional historians, academicians and eggheads to debate about. As a lay student of history, I take issue with Romila Thapar on an entirely different matter. It is her cussed insistence on interpreting (“explaining“, she calls it) Indian history in terms of Nationalism instead of Civilization. Explaining the history of India without reference to its Religion is tantamount to completely ignoring its definitive Civilization. Which is perhaps why a counter argument to Romila Thapar can be equally forceful as hers: What is so wrong in narrating and “explaining” Indian history in terms of “religious nationalism” that it must get rejected outright at once on the specious belief that it will only lead straight to “political authoritarianism”? Why should Thapar’s own so-called “integrated nationalistic” view of history be regarded as true and that it always will and must prevail over the alternate view of “religious nationalism”?
10. Thapar’s response to the above questions reeks of intellectual arrogance quite unbecoming of an academician of her stature. She imperiously dismisses out of hand the “religious nationalist” view of History as “unscientific” and hence invalid: (Quote) “An approach to history usually involves a theory of explanation. This means gathering reliable evidence on the subject to be researched, which is then analyzed, and a logical explanation sought for past events. None of this is required for the Hindutva approach to history which is largely the description of a past so constructed that it provides legitimacy for an ideology of present times. There is no check on whether the evidence is reliable and the explanation based on well-reasoned arguments. Professional historians therefore do not take it seriously”. Unquote
11. The problem with Romila Thapar’s historiography is it cannot seem to look beyond Nationalism and view India’s long history as “a history of a civilization”… to borrow the expression from Samuel Huntington. The reason for it being her blind, adamant and stout refusal to admit that Religion is at the very core of all world civilizations. Huntington, on the other hand, writes in his book that (quote): “Of all the objective elements which define civilizations, the most important is religion… To a very large degree, the major civilizations in human history have been closely identified with the world’s greatest religions“. In a later passage in the book, Huntington quotes another noted historian, Christopher Dawson who said, “The great religions are the foundations on which the great civilization rests”. (The Dynamics of World History). In fact, as Huntington points out, “Of Max Weber’s “five world religions”, four — Christianity, Islam, Hinduism and Confucianism — are associated with major civilizations”.
12. In a passage of rare insight into Indian history that few Western historians are ever known to possess, Huntington writes this: “In one form or another, Hinduism has been central to the culture of the Subcontinent since second millennium B.C….. It has continued in this role through modern times, even though India itself has a substantial Muslim community as well as several smaller cultural minorities”“. And then to support his view, he quotes another European historian, Braudel (author of “On History” and “History of Civilizations”) who wrote: “More than a religion or societal system, it (Hinduism) is the core of Indian civilization”.
13. The case being such in the view of many of the world’s most erudite historians of civilizations, such as Braudel, Huntington or Dawson, one may rightfully ask why should Romila Thapar find fault with the history of India when it is being re-explored through recasting it increasingly in the image of “religious nationalism“?
14. Furthermore, a reading of Huntington’s “The Clash of Civilization” can throw a lot of historical light on how and why Thapar zealously advocates her own historian creed called Secularism, which she claims ought to be the bedrock of the “inclusive, democratic, integrated and secular Nationalist” history of India.
15. Huntington reveals how it was the West or, more specifically, Europe that developed “the concept of civilization”. Europe used and exploited it to “provide a standard by which to judge societies, and during the 19th Century CE, Europeans devoted much intellectual, diplomatic, and political energy to elaborating the criteria by which non-European (or colonial) societies might be judged sufficiently “civilized” to be accepted as a members of the European-dominated international system…. Civilization meant Western civilization. International law was Western international law coming out of the tradition of Grotius. The international system was the Western Westphalian system of sovereign but “civilized” national states and the colonial territories they controlled…. The great political ideologies of the 20th century include liberalism, socialism, anarchism, corporatism, Marxism, communism, social democracy, conservatism, nationalism, fascism, and Christian democracy. They all share one thing in common: they are products of Western Civilization. No other civilization has generated a significant political ideology”.
16. Thus, the standard Thapar uses while sitting in judgment over how Indian history — as it is being re-written today in terms of “religious nationalism” — measures up to her own sacred creed of Secularism is most indubitably a Western one. In the battle as seen by Thapar fought between History authored in India by “Integrated Nationalism” and “Religious Nationalism“, she is very keen to emphasize that it is the Secular creed in the western (or colonial) sense that must always prevail over Religion in India. This is clearly what she says in the interview: “It is important to make a distinction between integrated nationalism and segregated nationalism. As long as integrated nationalism prevails there is unity of purpose, as there was in India initially after 1947. We were then concerned with building a society ensuring the welfare of all and took at least a few steps to do so.… Integrated nationalism does not make a distinction between ‘we’ and ‘they’ since every citizen is included. But segregated nationalism does make a distinction, giving priority and privileges to the ‘we’ and subordinating the ‘they’. Sometimes it is even a violent subordination to press home the difference between the dominant majority and the lesser others.“
17. Someone ought to recommend to Thapar to re-read Huntington so she is able to recollect that Secularism is a “western product” of a “western international system” of laws and ideologies. And also point it out to her that if she is going to talk of “violent subordination” (of the “dominant majority” over “the lesser others” in India), then she must in all fairness also speak of the violence that Prof. Huntington himself alluded to in truly reverberating lines in his book: “The West won the world not by the superiority of its ideas or values or religion (to which a few members of other civilizations were converted) but rather by its superiority in applying organized violence. Westerners often forget this fact; non-Westerners never do.”

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In an unpublished paper submitted as Hawkins Dissertation in 1897, the Indian historian Prof. K.V.Rangaswami Aiyangar (https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.207517) wrote: “Religion has played a very important part in the history of the Indian peoples. The Indian peoples have always been very religious in their tendencies… The Hindu mind is thoroughly penetrated and dominated by the religious spirit, the intense desire to know and act on truths which are not material… And this attachment to religion is the one remarkable racial feature of the Hindu mind that will strike any foreigner mind. And religion has played, is playing and will continue to play a very prominent part in the political history of the Hindus.”

It is because Romila Thapar does not quite comprehend or give due credence to the role of Religion in the founding of the very civilization of India that her “explanation” of this country’s History will always be found wanting, will always be incomplete and will always suffer from “tunnel vision”. She would do well therefore to pay heed to the almost prophetic words of Samuel Huntington’s “The Clash of Civilizations”:

“The West has never generated a major religion. The great religions of the world are all products of non-Western civilizations and, in most cases, antedate Western civilization. As the world moves out of its Western phase, the ideologies which typified late Western civilization decline, and their place is taken by religions and other culturally based forms of identity and commitment. The Westphalian separation of religion and international politics, an idiosyncratic product of Western civilization, is coming to an end, and religion, as Edward Mortimer suggests, is increasingly likely to intrude into international affairs. The intracivilizational clash of political ideas spawned by the West is being supplanted by an intercivilisational clash of culture and religion”.

If you don’t wake up soon, Ms. Romila Thapar, to the realities of modern India as she strives to take her rightful place in the international comity of nations in the 21st century, dear lady, I am afraid History will soon pass you by without you even noticing it’s shadow….

Sudarshan Madabushi