Message by Concerned Academics and Students of Centre for Historical Studies, JNU
Dear Asia Colleagues,
I am posting below a
statement issued by concerned faculty and students of the Centre for Historical
Studies at Jawaharlal Nehru University. It underscores the increasing
government role in pushing Indian universities far to the right, which in India
means promoting a Hindutva (Hindu nationalist) agenda. You might want to see
some press links to the event and the JNU faculty response:
Rick Asher
Major General G. D
Bakshi’s understanding of the ‘Sarasvati’ civilization
Many faculty members
of the Centre for Historical Studies, JNU, were surprised to see the notice
about a webinar to be addressed by Major General Bakshi on the ‘Sarasvati
civilization’, ostensibly hosted by the Centre for Historical Studies, JNU. As
this appeared in the midst of a pandemic and a lockdown, and as there were no
consultations amongst faculty on the matter, as is the routine practice, we
raised the issue with the concerned authorities, but are yet to receive a
response.
Some colleagues circulated a link to an earlier talk delivered
by Major General Bakshi on the theme, on which he has also written a book,
which was a revelation. Major General Bakshi’s
presentation had certain remarkable features. One was his recourse to the word
‘bloody’ with a frequency that was baffling and jarring, and abuse and
insinuations hurled primarily against his invisible antagonist, Romila Thapar,
professor emerita at the Centre for Historical Studies.
While arguments and
differences have always been part of the Centre’s traditions, abuse has not.
Neither is it healthy, to say the least. It intimidates and silence other
points of view - precisely what the learned gentleman claims he wants to avoid.
Further terms of abuse that have been reserved for what the gentleman calls the
army of leftist historians include chamchas - they are supposed to be lackeys
of scholars in Harvard and Oxford. Thapar and others are accused of not
accepting any changes in colonial British ideas of history. This ignores over
sixty years of scholarly work produced by her and others, rich in internal
debates, as well as in debates with scholars both inside and outside India.
It may be useful to
remind Major General Bakshi that passion and insinuations are poor substitutes
for serious scholarship. In this particular talk, scholars were accused of a
slavish mentality, of succumbing to nonsense, assertions that were left
unsubstantiated but articulated emphatically. The Aryan invasion theory was
resurrected by Major General Bakshi and then demolished. This is like setting
up a straw figure and knocking it down, as over the decades the question has
been discussed in all its complexity, painstakingly, by a range of scholars.
Major General Bakshi’s
characterization of the last 600 to 800 years of history in the subcontinent
revives an old communalized understanding, based on assertions rather than
substance. He describes it as one of rape, plunder, loot, the destruction of
temples and the abduction of women who were allegedly sold off to Bukhara and
Kabul. He also mentions the “Hindu holocaust”, in which 80 million to 100
million people are supposed to have died - again unsubstantiated. Major General
Bakshi seems unaware of the fact that warfare between states within the
subcontinent was endemic much before the time so-called outsiders.
Incidentally, these are named by him in a sequence that ignores chronology, as
the Afghans, Arabs, Mughals and Turks. Whether it is deliberate or unintended
is not clear.
Major General Bakshi,
despite his avowed antipathy to all things western, relies on the history of
India as reconstructed by James Mill, in the 19th century. This communal
periodization of history has been critiqued systematically by the very
historians whom he decries. One of the assertions made by Major General Bakshi
is that the historians opposed to him believe that Indian history began with
the time of Akbar.
That such an assertion
can be made publicly, dismissing and ignoring, or demonstrating a complete lack
of awareness of the rich and complex scholarship on ancient, early historical
and early medieval Indian history throughout the country, including in CHS/ JNU
since its inception is shocking to say the least. 2 Major General Bakshi’s
agenda, evidently, is to try and equate the Harappan civilization, which he
insists on re-designating as the Sarasvati civilization, with the evidence of
Vedic texts. The flaws and the futility of this line of argument have been
demonstrated time and again, but this does not deter him from reiterating
these.
In his case, the
argument seems to rely on invoking earthquakes, in pushing back the date of the
civilization to 8000 or 9000 years ago, and in assuring us that there is
continuity between past and present in terms of the use of bindis, sindur,
mangal sutra, bangles, yoga, meditation, the Shiva linga, boats, and pots, a
random set of material and cultural traits etc. from the past to the present.
Such comparisons of traits without placing them in historical context is not
particularly useful as a historical method, irrespective of one’s ideological
predilections.
Again, given his
claimed technical expertise about tanks and chariots, it is surprising that he
draws on the evidence of wheeled vehicles, but fails to distinguish between the
spoked wheel, mentioned in Vedic texts, and the solid wheel, documented from
the terracotta toys found in the Harappan civilization. The evidence for
contact between the bronze age Mesopotamian civilization (c. 3000 BCE onwards)
and the Harappan civilization, discussed and analyzed in almost a century of
scholarship, and its chronological implications are not even brought into this
discussion on chronology.
History, fortunately,
is much more than about claims to antiquity and continuity - it is also about
change, contexts, and developing an understanding from different perspectives.
Historians have moved beyond the unqualified glorification of civilizations to
trying to reconstruct what lives were like for ordinary people. Unfortunately,
pushing the kind of agenda that is dear to Major General Bakshi’s heart does
not further this understanding. Nor does it demonstrate any deep insight that
he may have to offer.
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