Mapping The Contours Of State-Making And Nation-Building Beyond The Hindu Kush
- IJLLR Journal
- 4 days ago
- 2 min read
Dr. (Prof.) Varinder Kumar Kaushik, Professor (Retired), Punjabi University, Patiala
Dhruv Kaushik, Advocate, Delhi High Court
“The constitutional lawyer, however, must always, if he is to comprehend his subject and treat it fruitfully, be a historian as well as a lawyer”
– James Bryce
I. BRYCE, SMITH, CONTRADICTIONS AND CONNECTIONS
The idea of ‘India’ that we are familiar with today did not exist when the calls for the dominance of a nation-state were first heard in Europe. Once we begin reading the history of the Indian Subcontinent, we find that it is rid with different civilisations crossing the Hindu Kush mountains for varied reasons. When these civilisations interacted with the locals over hundreds of years, the cultural bandwidth of population continued getting more diverse. Before, the Mughals more or less assimilated most of “India” into one state/empire a quick history lesson would make clear the existence of a host of independent kingdoms through time. It is no secret that all of these kingdoms had unique identities of their own. In this context, the usage of the word India is in a territorial sense. Here, by India we mean the territory of the Indian Subcontinent which was assimilated into the erstwhile state of British India. We exclude the Mauryan Empire as assimilation because it pre-dates several other incursions in the early and later medieval age.
There is a decent argument to be made that today’s Indian State is not just incredibly diverse but inside the borders lay more than just one nation. The flip side argues that India has always been a single nation. I am inclined to agree with the former and further argue that India has been slowly assimilated the diverse ethno-cultural identities under the banner of the Tiranga. This process of nation-building has not been without its hiccups, but it is sufficient to say that the project has been a success. The consistent attempts to undo this work in the last few years is a separate matter altogether. In this paper, we are concerned with the decades long nation- building process of the Republic of India after 1947 which turned out to be a success against all odds.
