ENGLISH EDUCATION TO DESTROY TIMELESS BHARAT’S NATIONAL HINDU IDENTITY-V

V.SUNDARAM I.A.S.

This is the Vth Part of my review of the book titled ‘EDUCATING TO CONFUSE AND DISRUPT: Defiling History and Education System of India’, authored by two bold intellectual Kshatriyas Professor Makkhan Lal and Professor Rajendra Dixit, who mercifully are not the usually ignorant servile, spineless, pseudo-secular and anti-Hindu academic vermin including the most vicious and virulent Marxist brand, sponsored by the Sonia Congress predatory and colonial Government dressed in brief imperial authority.

Most people view history in terms of different periods like ancient, medieval and modern — each period being characterized by a different political, economic and social setup. History is neither a simple chronicle of the past nor a list of rulers and kings and the narratives of their rules. The past is not simply a collage of different ages or a hotchpotch of facts. History is an extremely complex discipline and the historians disagree on what it is.

E. H Carr, in his famous book, ‘What is History?’ wrote that ‘History is a continuous process of interaction between the historian and his facts (Thereby implying that it was changeable: these words within brackets mine.)’. Thus he fully endorsed the view of another historian R.G Collingwood who in his equally famous book ‘The Idea of History’ wrote: ‘Each age writes its own history and each age must reinterpret the past in the light of its own preoccupations’. The great Italian Historian and social theorist Benedetto Croce said all history is contemporary history.

What these great historians have said makes it clear that no complete description of the past can be given and that all historical descriptions are by nature temporary and provisional. Taking note of all these perceptions of history, Professor Makkhan Lal and Professor Rajendra Dixit HAVE SAID THAT ALL THIS IS TRUE NOT ONLY OF HISTORICAL DESCRIPTIONS, BUT ALSO OF HISTORICAL EXPLANATIONS AND INTERPRETATIONS. The main idea behind all these suggestions like ‘each age having to write its own history’ is not to produce a root-and-branch new version of history every 10, 20, or 50 years, but to continue refining and revising what has been written before, while also opening up totally new areas.

To quote the words of Professor Makkhan Lal and Professor Rajendra Dixit in this context: “We must have proper balance of time, of change and continuity and of similarity and difference which are central to our understanding of the nature of history and the dynamics of social development. We, in our enthusiasm, must not lose sight of the fact that ‘each age is a unique manifestation of the human spirit with its own culture and values. For one age to understand another, there must be recognition that the passage of time has profoundly altered both, condition of life and the mentality of men and women. History thus must be written and rewritten observing the long established, though constantly developing canons of historical profession. History must be as reliable as it is possible to make it.”

All the Marxist, both mercenary and devious, historians of Maulana Jawaharlal Nehru University have been working day and night with the full political backing of the Congress Government of India to produce their own doctored version of Indian history. According to these Marxist historians, real history of India begins with the Arab conquest of Sindh in 712 AD. I would like to put this simple question to the intellectual Maulvis of Maulana Jawaharlal Nehru University : What is your nefarious political aim? Are you writing the history of a largely Hindu India or the history of Wholly Muslim Pakistan?

The problem with Marxist historiography and its relationship with history is quite curious and indeed bewildering. For all Marxist historians, the problem of history is not just understanding ‘what happened’, ‘how it happened’ and ‘why it happened’. For them the problem is ‘How to change the world?’ by the perverted and prostituted use of doctored history. At the bottom of this view lies the fundamental Marxist belief that the society we live in is the bad bourgeois society and very fortunately, this society is in a state of crisis. The good society which lies around the corner can be easily attained if only ‘WE’ work systematically to destroy the language, the values, the culture, the ideology of this bourgeois society. According to the Marxists, this calls for a massive, radical Left-wing political programme and consequently everything that historians ought to write, every criticism they ought to make, is determined and controlled by this over-riding political objective of destruction of bourgeois society.

In post Independent India, according to the Congress Party from the days of Maulana Bandit Nehru till today — and even more so for the Communist-Marxist traitors — the bourgeois society means only the Hindu Society and none other. The British Imperialist historians in the 18th and 19th centuries and even in the early 20th century consistently opined that the ancient Hindus had no sense of history writing and whatever was written in the name of history was nothing more than a mythical story without any common sense or foundation in fact. Many anti-Hindu pseudo-secular historians and Marxist Historians schooled in this colonial missionary tradition in post-independent India have revelled in denigrating anything and everything ‘Hindu’ or ‘Indian’.

Professor Makkhan Lal and Professor Rajendra Dixit have summarily rejected this prejudiced and wholly unbalanced and insane verdict of this paid band of mercenary storm-troopers of the Congress Party and the Communist Parties. To quote their exact words in this context: ‘To say that Indians had no awareness and concern about their own history and no sense of writing it would be grossly incorrect. The knowledge of History was given a very high place in ancient India. It was accorded sanctity equal to that of a VEDA. The Atharva Veda, Brahmanas and Upanishads include ITIHAS-PURANA as one of the branches of knowledge. Kautilya in his ‘Arthashastra’ (4th century BC) advices the king to devote a part of his time everyday to hearing the narrations from history. According to the Puranas, the following are the subject matters of history: Sarga (evolution of universe), PratiSarga (involution of Universe), Manvantar (recurring of time), Vamsha (genealogical list of kings and sages), and VamshanuCharita (life stories of some selected characters). In the context of the Puranas, it has to be understood that in ancient India, ITIHAS was looked upon as a means to illuminate the present and the future in the light of the past.’

Thus according to our Hindu ancestors of ancient India, the purpose of history was to generate a holistic understanding and inculcate a sense of history and sacrifice to be made by individuals for their families, by families for their clans, by clans for their villages and by villages for Janapadas and the RASHTRA, and ultimately for all of humanity as such. HISTORY WAS VIEWED AND TREATED AS A POWERFUL VEHICLE FOR THE AWAKENING OF CULTURAL AND SOCIAL CONSCIOUSNESS. It was perhaps for this reason that the narration of Puranas was made a part of the annual ritual in every village and town during the rainy season and at the time of festivals. This hoary and glorious tradition continues even today in many of the villages and town of India. Great historians like F.E Pargiter and H.C RayChaudhury have attempted to write our history on the basis of the genealogies of various dynasties given in the Puranas. The Greek Ambassador Megasthenes in the court of ChandraGupta Maurya (324BC to 300BC) has testified to the existence of a list of 153 Kings whose reigns had spanned, till then, a long period of 6053 years.

These two authors have given a very interesting account of writings on the history of ancient India by the foreigners from pre-Christian times.  Megasthenes the Greek Ambassador wrote a book about India titled ‘Indika’ which is no longer available to us. We know about his writings through the extracts in the writings of Diodorous, Strabo and Arrian. We can see that Megasthenes had little or virtually no understanding of the Indian society and the Indian social systems. For example, he mentions that there were 7 castes in the Indian society. Professor Makkhan Lal and Professor Rajendra Dixit have rightly summed up that the discrepancies in Megasthenes’s work seem to be rooted in his want of knowledge of any Indian language and in his not being a part of the Indian society and psyche.

Many Chinese travellers visited India from the early century of the Christian era to about 1000 AD. They came as Buddhist pilgrims to study Buddhism and therefore their accounts are somewhat tilted towards Buddhism. Of these, the most illustrious ones are Fa-Hien, Hiuen-Tsang and I-Tsing. Though we get some general information about the places/ regions they visited, from their accounts, yet the problem is that they give an exaggerated account of Buddhism during the respective periods. For example, Hiuen-Tsang describes Emperor Harshavardhana as a staunch follower of Buddhism in the first half of the 7th century. This is not correct. In his own Royal epigraphs, Emperor Harshavardhana has portrayed himself as an ardent devotee of Lord Siva. Hiuen-Tsang failed to understand that unlike foreign rulers, Hindu rulers give equal respect to all religions.

The next important phase of Indian historiography began with Al-Beruni, the great Muslim traveller and historian. Born in Central Asia in 973 AD, he died in Ghazni in present day Afghanistan in 1048 AD. He was the court historian of Mahmud of Ghazni. When Mahmud Ghazni attacked India several times in the first quarter of the 11th century AD, Al-Beruni accompanied him. He also visited several parts of India. He studied Sanskrit and tried to gain knowledge of Hindu sources. His acute observations cover a range of subjects from philosophy, religion, culture and society, to science, literature, art and medicine. Professor Makkhan Lal and Professor Rajendra Dixit have given this verdict on Al-Beruni: “Al-Beruni’s work can be termed as relatively objective … Al-Beruni appears to be comparatively less influenced by religious and racial considerations which we so often encounter in the writings of his successor Muslim and European historians.’

While Professor Makkhan Lal and Professor Rajendra Dixit have dealt with the famous work of Al-Beruni written in the 11th century in some detail, for reasons best known to them, they have completely ignored making detailed references to the historical works in Persian and Arabic produced by Muslim historians of Northern India from 1100 AD to 1700 AD. Just in one perfunctory paragraph, Professor Makkhan Lal and Professor Rajendra Dixit, seem to have dismissed the very important historical writings of Muslim historians relating to the savage and large scale destruction of Hindu temples, looting of property belonging to the Hindus, raping of Hindu women and girls and other brutal atrocities committed by Muslim Kings and Emperors like Muhammad Ghauri (1173 AD-1208 AD), Ghazis in Gujarat (1197 AD), Kutubuddin Aibak (1206 AD-1210 AD), Allauddin Khilji (1296 AD-1316 AD), Muhammad Bin Tughlaq (1325 AD-1351 AD), Feroz Shah Tughlaq (1351 AD-1388 AD), Timur (1398 AD-1399 AD), Babur (1519 AD-1530 AD), Sher Shah Suri (1540 AD-1545 AD), Akbar the Great (1556 AD-1605 AD), Jahangir (1605 AD-1627 AD), Shah Jehan (1628 AD-1658 AD) and Aurangazeb (1658 AD-1707 AD).

In this context, let me quote the words of Professor Makkhan Lal and Professor Rajendra Dixit to illustrate my point: ‘During the Medieval Period, many Sultans and Emperors got the history of their regimes written. These rulers employed scholars and ordered them to write the history of their ancestors and their rule. Naturally, these are very heavily loaded in favour of the rulers. Though these are a good source of medieval history, the fact that they were sponsored by the rulers themselves should not be forgotten while using them as a source to write the history of the period’.

Let me cite some examples of Muslim destruction of Hindu temples in several parts of Northern India, which ought to have been referred to at least in outline by Professor Makkhan Lal and Professor Rajendra Dixit.

a)      Hasan Nizami, in his chronicle ‘TAJ-UL-MASSIR’ has given a vivid account of the destruction of Hindu Temples carried out by Muhammed Ghauri from 1190 AD to 1206 AD. He has said ‘The army of Islam was completely victorious, and a hundred thousand (1,00,000) Hindus swiftly departed to the fire of hell. After this great victory, the army of Islam marched forward to Ajmer, where we obtained so much booty and wealth that you might have said that the secret depositories of the seas and hills have been revealed. When the Sultan remained in Ajmer he destroyed the pillars and foundations of the Hindu Idol temples and built Mosques instead’.

b) Hasan Nizami, in his chronicle ‘TAJ-UL-MASSIR’ wrote as follows about Kutubuddin Aibak (1206AD-1210AD): ‘Kutubuddin is the pillar of Islam and the destroyer of infidels … he has employed himself in extirpating the enemy of religion — the Hindus, and deluged the land of Hind with the blood of kaffirs … He has sent the world of idolatry to the fire of Hell … has founded Mosques in places of images and idols’. Hasan Nizami has also stated: “Kutubuddin built the Jami Masjid at Delhi and adorned it with the stones and gold obtained from the temples which had been destroyed by elephants”.

Contemporary Muslim accounts clearly show that Muhammad Bakhtiyar Khalji (1204AD-1206AD), the general of Sultan Kutubuddin Aibak had a penchant for seeking out and destroying Hindu and Buddhist sites of learning. He destroyed the 2 most famous centers of Buddhist learning –— Nalanda University and Vikramshila University in 1206. More than 10,000 “Brahmins” (actually Buddhist Monks) with shaven heads were put to death. The Muslim marauders also destroyed the very precious and ancient library at Nalanda. Tradition has it that more than 30,000 books were set on fire by Muhammad Bakhtiyar Khalji.

c) Jiauddin Barani, the Muslim chronicler of the reign of Allauddin Khilji (1296AD-1316AD) recorded in his famous work Tarikh-I-Feroz-Shahi: “All Gujarat became a prey to the Allauddin’s army and the idol of Somnath, reinstalled after the departure of Mohammad of Ghazni, was removed to Delhi where it was laid down for the people to trample upon.”

d) Jiauddin Barani in his Tarikh-I-Feroz-Shahi has recorded the cannibalistic atrocities of Firoz Shah Tughlak (1351AD-1388AD) carried out against Hindu women in these words: “The Hindu ladies were not just raped, they were subjected to unparalleled tortures like penetration of female organs with red hot iron rods, sewing up of vagina and chopping-off  breasts by the Muslim invaders.”

e) Timur (1398AD-1399AD) in his autobiography Mulfuzat-I-Timur has stated that he killed more than 100,000 helpless Hindus who had become his prisoners.

f) In his autobiography Babur-Nama, Babar (1519AD-1530AD) has clearly stated that in 1528-29, Mir Baqi, a Mughal commander, by Babar’s order destroyed the Temple at Ayodhya commemorating Lord Rama’s birth place, built a Mosque in its place.

The anti-Hindu and anti-Kafir history text books produced by NCERT right from the days of Professor Nurul Hasan till the days of Muslim appeaser and Sonia Congress terrorist Arjun Singh, have waxed eloquent on the cultural and intellectual achievements of barbarous and savage Muslim invaders from the days of Mahmud of Ghazni (997 AD-1030 AD) to the time of Aurangazeb (1658 Ad-1707 AD). Despicable Congress Ministers would like to effectively conceal the solid facts of colossal destruction of Hindu Temples by the Muslim invaders from 1000 AD to 1707 AD in all the NCERT textbooks and erase it from the Hindu collective memory and consciousness.

I am of the view that Professor Makkhan Lal and Professor Rajendra Dixit ought to have dealt with these Muslim atrocities against the hapless Hindus from 1000 AD to 1707 AD in greater detail.

After the death of Shahjahan in 1658, the next phase of Indian historiography relates to the work done by European scholars, mainly on account of the interest evinced by the missionaries. They produced a large number of books but none can be compared to what Al-Beruni had written. Though he was a devout Muslim, yet he showed greater objectivity in writing his book on India. On the other hand the writings of the European missionaries were filed with their racial and religious prejudices. I endorse the view of Professor Makkhan Lal and Professor Rajendra Dixit that these missionary writers were mostly interested in learning and writing about Indian history in order to preach and spread Christianity. These two writers have rightly observed: ‘Their contributions (European writers) during the 17th and 18th centuries were affected also by the religious, intellectual and political movements in Europe. Indian history became an easy victim of political and religious problems of Europe.’

The next stage of Indian historiography began with the advent of the Age of Enlightenment in Europe. In India, many scholars like John Holwell (1711-1798), Nathaniel Halhed (1751-1830) and Alaxender Dow (1735-1779), belonging to this period — and associated in various capacities with the British East India Company — wrote about Indian history and culture proving the pre-eminence of Indian civilization in the ancient world. Most of these writers, on the basis of Puranic references, described the immense antiquity of human beings.

Nathaniel Halhed wrote that Hindu texts contained a higher revelation than the Christian ones, they pre-dated the Great Deluge described in the Old Testament and declared that ‘The mythology, as well as cosmogony of the Egyptians, Greeks and Romans were borrowed from the doctrines of the ‘brahmins’.

Nathaniel Halhed also critically examined the various aspects of Indian history, religion, mythology, etc. He discussed the vast periods of time of human history assigned to the Four Yugas and concluded that ‘human reason can no more reconcile itself to the idea of patriarchal longevity of a few thousand years for the entire span of Hindu race’.

The early British writers on India mostly working for the East India Company from 1660 to 1760 were all very friendly towards India and its culture. Based on the huge quantity of literature produced on India during the 17th and 18th centuries, many scholars and intellectuals who had never traveled to India wrote about it.

Voltaire (1694-1778)

Voltaire (1694-1778), the great French Writer viewed India as the homeland of religions in its oldest and purest form and also as the cradle of world civilization. He paid this tribute to the Indians: “To India and Indians we owe our numbers, our backgammon, , our chess, our first principles of geometry and fables which have become our own. In short, I am convinced that everything — Astronomy, Astrology, Metaphysics, etc. — comes to us from the banks of River Ganges.”

The French naturalist and traveler, Pierre de Sonnerate wrote that all language originated in India, which he considered to be the cradle of civilizations. In 1807, the great metaphysician Schelling wrote “What is Europe really but a sterile tank which owes everything to Oriental grafts?” The great Philosopher Emannual Kant also acknowledged the greatness of the ancient Indian culture and civilization. His great words are worth quoting here: “Their (Hindu) religion has a great purity and one can find traces of pure concept of Divinity which cannot be easily found elsewhere”. J Michelet declared “The Vedas were undoubtedly the first monument of the world…  It is from India has emanated a torrent of light and the flow of reasons and light”.

These fraternal feelings of admiration and wonder of European towards India completely changed and became Indo-phobia that became the norm in early 19th century Britain. This norm was constructed by EVANGELISM AND UTILITARIANISM. Charles Grant was the architect of Evangelism and James Mill that of Utilitarianism.