On its 03-May-2009 dated Sunday edition The Hindu Newspaper has made a study of

the preamble of the Manifesto of the Bharathiya Janata Party (Indian People’s Party –
BJP).

In the preamble of the manifesto drafted by Dr. Murli Manohar Joshi, some claims have
been made about the greatness of India in pre-British period. The Hindu claims to have
employed a team of eminent historians who have analyzed each of these claims and
have negated each of them as either false or as exaggerations.

Here we at www.tamiltalk.org a Tamil forum for the discussion of culture, society,

science, history etc. try to study the factual basis of the evaluation of the historians as
presented by The Hindu and also the veracity of the claims of Dr. Joshi. And we present
you with Dr. Joshi’s claims, The Hindu’s response to the claims and the facts as we
discovered them.

Yours in the interest of truth,

www.tamiltalk.org team.

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 I
“India is not…China is older”

Joshi: Indian civilisation is perhaps the most ancient and continuing civilisation of the world. India
has a long history and has been recognised by others as a land of great wealth and even greater
wisdom.

“The Hindu” response: India is not the most ancient civilisation. Civilisation is generally defined
as having city cultures and that would make Egypt, Mesopotamia and China older. Nor is it the
only continuous culture since China has a continuous culture that is older.

The facts: Harappan civilization or Saraswathi-Sindhu civilization did not emerge in vacuum, but
was the result of long drawn socio-economic processes
that included cultural dimensions. French archeologist
Jean-François Jarrige had traced the antecedents of
Harappan culture to the site in Mergarh north of
Mohenjo-Daro and has established an unbroken cultural
continuity from that early date to Harappan civilization.1
Similarly Harappan roots have been discovered from
within the geographical area of modern India as well. In
an International seminar on Indus Civilisation, director of
Harappan seal to the current
calendar art in popular Hinduism the Archaeological Survey of India BR Mani revealed that
continuity is self-evident there were pockets where urbanisation would have
started before the well-developed urban civilisation of
2
the Harappans. Even as we trace the evolution of Harappan civilization which pushes the advent
of Indian civilization further back in timeline, historians have accepted the fact that Indian society
today has many of its cultural roots in Harappan civilization. Even Iravatham Mahadevan a
scholar who holds on to the Aryan-Dravidian binary, has stated that he “would not be surprised to
find that the greater part of modern Hinduism has a Harappan lineage.”3 Of course Egypt and
Mesopotamian civilizations do have hoary past but their descendents have abandoned these
ancient cultures for new jealous sky gods. Hence when Joshi says that Indian civilization is
“perhaps the most ancient and continuing civilization” he is definitely and technically
right.

“The Hindu” has shown its Chinese loyalty by calling China as having a continuous culture how
can China today can be called the most ancient and continuous culture when the Red Guards of
the Communist China during the Cultural Revolution vandalized Buddhist statues labeling them
part of the four olds to be destroyed: old customs, old habits, old culture and old thinking. The
definite break with cultural continuity came for China when young Red Guards in 1966 smashed
the Buddhist images at the Biyun Monastery, the Wofo Monastery, the Summer Palace and the
other shrines, temples and parks around Beijing and replaced them with portraits of Mao
Zedong.4 To call the present China a cultural continuity is a joke - absurd, sick and cruel.

1
Jarrige,J.F. and M.Santoni, The Antecedents of Civilization in the Indus Valley, Scientific American, 243.8 (1980),
pp.102-10
2
Grain of rice points to pre-Harappan culture, Time of India, 5-Jan-2006
3
http://www.harappa.com/script/mahadevantext.html
4
John Kieschnick, The impact of Buddhism on Chinese material culture, Princeton University Press, 2003 p.70

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 II
Famines Pre-British vs. British

Joshi: According to foreigners visiting this country, Indians were regarded as the best
agriculturists in the world. Records of these travels from the 4th Century BC till early-19th Century
speak volumes about our agricultural abundance which dazzled the world. The Thanjavur (900-
1200 AD) inscriptions and Ramanathapuram (1325 AD) inscriptions record 15 to 20 tonnes per
hectare production of paddy.

“The Hindu” response: Famine was common and is mentioned in Indian texts. We do not have
to go looking for certificates of merit from foreign visitors. References are made to anavrishti and
ativrishti and locusts as the cause. Famine is referred to in the Ramayana [1.8.12 ff] and the
Mahabharata [12.139] and in the latter it led to people eating all kinds of unsavoury things. The
frequency of references to the 12-year famine is found in many texts. Manu in his Dharma-
shastra, states that in times of famine social codes can be dispensed with. [102 ff] The Jatakas
refer to famines. [1.75, etc;]

Facts: In his 1917 book “England's debt to India; a historical narrative of

Britain's fiscal policy in India”, the great Indian freedom fighter and martyr, Lala
Lajpath Rai speaks of a paper titled "Some Plain Facts about Famines in India"
which was read before and then published by the East India Association of
London. In that paper, Hindu legends, and the great epics, the Mahabharata
and the Ramayana were requisitioned to prove that severe famines occurred in
pre-British India.5 Of course Lajpath Rai proceeds to prove the hollowness of
the argument. But it is déjà vu British colonial propaganda in
Ironically nearly a century ago
“The Hindu” 2009.That a colonial British propaganda line is being Indian freedom fighters faced the
rehashed by the “eminent historians” of “The Hindu” makes one same arguments from British
propaganda that The Hindu is
feel the symbolic irony of it all. rehashing today.

Now let us see the facts. Dr. W.B.Rahudkar one of the eminent agricultural scientists of India
provides extensive documentary evidence for the general state of Indian agriculture during the
advent of colonial period. He provides the testimony of Luke Scrafton (1770) a member of Clive's
council, that of Dr. Wallick (1832) the Superintendent of the Royal Botanical Gardens in India,
Augustus Voelcker report on the improvement of Indian Agriculture (1897) – each testifying to the
efficacy of Indian agriculture. (This is not seeking certificates of merits from foreigners rather
showcasing the documentary evidence for the health state of Indian agriculture as recorded by
the observers of that time.) Dr. Rahudkar goes on to analyze the reason for the downfall of Indian
agriculture. He states:

This excellent picture of Indian agriculture got radically changed after the British
started ruling the country through their imported system of ownership of land,
land tenure, land revenue, laws, education, imposition of western knowledge of
6
agriculture and establishment of the Department of Agriculture.

5
Lajpat Rai, England's Debt to India: A Historical Narrative of Britain's Fiscal Policy in India, Original 1917, re-published
by BiblioBazaar, LLC, 2008, p.264
6
W.B.Rahudkar, Traditions, Beliefs and Supersitions in Agricultural Production, in Productivity Of Land And Water, (Ed. J.
H. Patil, M A Chitale, S B Varade, Shankar Raoji Chavan), Taylor & Francis, 1997, pp.285-6

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This may seem a harsher indictment by a Gandhian agricultural scientist. However voluminous
evidence exists to show that the pre-British famines were highly localized; originated more due to
local natural causes and hence people often moved
over to other areas and thus were not drastically
affected. On the other hand the famines during the
British period were the result of mismanagement or
callous disregard for human suffering and extended
over vast areas. Thus the British famines were
literally holocausts.

Historian Kaushik Chakraborthy explains the

Scholars opine that British disruption of
difference between pre-British and British famines.
traditional Indian resource management was one
The pre-British traditional resource management in
of the reasons for severe famines during British
rule.
India allowed local control and this resulted in “food
security and virtual absence of all India famines.” As against this the British colonial rule led to
“the gradual establishment of state control over resource use” which in turn “displaced and
marginalized indigenous population, indigenous knowledge and tried to over determine natural or
ecological balance leading directly to water and food scarcity, environmental degradation, and
famine, which took millions of lives.”7 Economic historians of the famine also point out that pre-
British traditional famine relief measures effective in ameliorating the human sufferings like
8 th
“dignified relief and tax forgiveness” were “more humanitarian”. In fact as early as 7 century CE
Saivaite monks effectively offered humanitarian relief to famine affected areas in South India
using the temple wealth.

Further the eminent historians of “The Hindu” while

speaking about the famines in Indic literature are silent
about the rich tradition in India of feeding the hungry
people. From Vedic dictum to produce food and give it to
others, Thirumoolar’s injunction to feed everyone with no
discrimination, Buddhist altruism – the Indic tradition of
food sharing has been a highly effective decentralized
famine relief mechanism. Given the fact that pre-British
Thirumoolar instructs Thirugnana
humanity to share famines were often the result of natural failures and Sambanthar –7
th

food with the needy mostly localized, the value system of food sharing was century Saivaite
without any Saint obtained
discrimination. Such an effective counter to such famines. financial help from
civilizational values temple and offered
have helped India to humanitarian relief to
Of course “The Hindu” group of historians simply missed
contain localized famine afflicted
such little facts. After all Thirumoolar is no Confucius and
famines of pre-British people. The famine
times. was localized.
Manimekalai is no Maoist, for these “eminent historians”
employed by pro-Chinese newspaper to take notice of.

So what Joshi claims is factually correct. There was over all food security. A localized regional
scarcity was organically balanced by localized prosperity. Further famine relief measures were
benevolent, decentralized and effective.

7
Kaushik Chakraborthy , Economy Of Eastern India From Pre-Colonial To The British Empire: abstract, presented at
panel on the British Empire and Famines in South Asia, Fifth International Convention of Asia Scholars
8
Mike Davis, Late Victorian holocausts: El Niño famines and the making of the third world, Verso 2001, p.167

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 III
Was education universal in pre-British India?

Joshi: It has been established beyond doubt by the several reports on education at the end of the
18th Century and the writings of Indian scholars that not only did India have a functioning
indigenous educational system but that it actually compared more than favourably with the
system obtaining in England at the time in respect of the number of schools and colleges
proportionate to the population, the number of students in schools and colleges, the diligence as
well as the intelligence of the students, the quality of the teachers and the financial support
provided from private and public sources. Contrary to the then prevailing opinion, those attending
school and college included an impressive percentage of lower caste students, Muslims and girls.

“The Hindu” response: There were no schools or colleges as we know them today in ancient
India. Upper caste children were educated in mathas, agraharas and sometimes monasteries.
Children following a profession were apprentices in that profession. Lower castes and women
were not educated generally. In Sanskrit plays they are the ones who speak the vernacular
language Prakrit whilst the upper caste, educated persons speak Sanskrit.

The Facts: Of course there were no schools or colleges in ancient

India as we know them today. Nor were there universities and
libraries, as we know them today. But then why do we call the
University of Nalanda – a university and the Library of Alexandria a
library? It is because we are able to recognize their general nature
and purpose beyond the modern features of their present age
counterparts. In the same way the Thinnai schools of the yester-
centuries were schools. The British form of education destroyed
these de-centralized and cost-effective structures, rather than
improving and evolving upon them so that mass education could be
Traditional mythology states provided in a more egalitarian way.
that Krishna and his brother
both cowherds studied in
ancient Gurukul along with
It is understandable that an alien
Brahmins with no
discrimination. colonial government destroyed and
demonized the Indian system. But what
is incomprehensible is the way newspapers like “The Hindu” are
perpetuating these colonial myths.

Gandhian historian Dharampal shows that the students from so-

th
called low caste studied in the pre-British traditional schools of 19
century India. In the Malabar area the proportion of the so-called Gandhian historian of
science Dharampal busted
twice born in the schools was below 19 percent that of Shudras and many colonial myths about
other castes was 54 percent. In the Kannada speaking Bellary traditional Indian education
through his well documented
district the twice-born was 33 percent while the Shudras and other book “A beautiful tree”.
castes was 63 percent and in the Oriya speaking Ganjam the twice-
born was 35.6 percent while Shudras and other caste was 63.5 percent.9 In Burdwan region of
West Bengal it was found that though missionaries ran 13 mission schools, W.Adam's report on

9
Dharampal, A Beautiful Tree: Indigenous India Education in the Eighteenth Century, Biblia Impex, 1983. pp .22-23

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 the state of education in Bengal 1835-38 revealed
that, of the 760 scholars from 16 of the "lowest
castes" 674 scholars were from the native schools
10
while only 86 were from mission schools.

Let us compare this situation with England, which

was not under any colonial drainage of its wealth.
Even then in 19th century the education for laborers
was severely opposed on religious grounds. For
example, in 1807 Davies Gilbert who was an
th
A 19 century French drawing of a “Hindoo” eminent scientist and citizen spoke in the Commons
school that “giving education to the laboring classes of the
poor…would render them factious and refractory
…would enable them to read seditious pamphlets, vicious books and publications against
11
Christianity …render them insolent and indolent to their superiors…”

Sanskrit was not an exclusive language of a particular caste or region in India. The Adi Kavi of
Sanskrit Valmiki was a tribal and the greatest Sanskrit dramatist Kalidasa was a Sudra. In latter
periods, even in Kerala which was considered as “lunatic asylum” by Swami Vivekananda
because of casteist degradation of fellow human beings by so-called upper castes, Sri Narayana
Guru was able to study Sanskrit in the traditional school system. His Sanskrit teacher was also a
non-Brahmin.12

It is a historical fact that the caste system is an undemocratic system. The

evils of caste system should be undone. It is the duty of every educated
Indian to eliminate the demeaning imprints of caste system from the
society. But that need not blind us to the merits of our traditional institutions
which we lost during the colonial regime. These traditional institutions are
not the same as caste and they also provide us the way to mitigate the
evils of casteism. However while the British destroyed these traditional
egalitarian institutions, they also preserved the caste and transformed it
Sri Narayana Guru – into a frozen hierarchical system.
Vedantin and social
reformer studied
So here also Joshi is right in that we need to find our egalitarian
Sanskrit in traditional
system from a non-
traditional institutions and their strengths. And the twist that “the
Brahmin teacher.
eminent historians” are trying to give to the claims of merits to indigenous
system by mapping it to casteism is typical of “their line, their fraud” as Arun Shourie pointed out
in his famous book on the so-called eminent historians. .

10
Dharampal:1983
11
John Rule, The labouring classes in early industrial England 1750-1850, Longman 1986, p.235.
12
Nataraja Guru, The word of the Guru, Paico Publishers, 1968, p.256

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 IV
Technological advancements in ancient India: Fact or fiction

Joshi: Old British documents established that India was far advanced in the technical and
educational fields than Britain of 18th and early-19th Century. Its agriculture technically and
productively was far superior; it produced a much higher grade of iron and steel. The Iron Pillar at
Mehrauli in Delhi has withstood the ravages of time for 1,500 years or more without any sign of
rusting or decay.

“The Hindu” response: The iron-pillar at the Qutab has rusted but the rust cannot be seen as it
is in the socket at the top. Astronomy, mathematics and medicine were at a premium from the
Seventh century onwards when there was close interaction between scholars from Alexandria,
Baghdad, India and China.

The Facts: As far as the iron-pillar, “The Hindu” indulges in petty word
play. The point is that ancient India had a technology for producing
highly corrosion resistant iron. In fact the eminent metallurgist
Professor T.R.Anatharaman who brought the first book entirely
devoted to the technical and scientific aspects of the Delhi iron pillar
titled it "The Rustless Wonder - A study of the iron pillar at Delhi". This
was published by Vigyan Prasar of New Delhi in
1996. Here the term rustless by the eminent
metallurgist is used to denote the high resistance
to atmospheric corrosion by the iron pillar which is
definitely a wonder of ancient technology of India.
It is unfortunate that a newspaper which once
prided itself as a “national newspaper” has fallen
so much in ethics that it is indulging in word
jugglery just to deny the due achievements of ancient India because of
ideological vested interests that have infiltrated this once respected
institution.
Pythagoras: Will
Indic influence on As far as the flow of knowledge is concerned, while it is true that in ancient
him, ever be
taught to Indian
times synthesis of knowledge from various civilizations often happened at
students? knowledge centers of the world like Kanchi or Alexandria, the Euro-centric
history writing has often emphasized only West to East transmission of
knowledge. Hence it is necessary that Indo-centric writing of history is needed which should
document the flow of knowledge from East to West not only in spiritual philosophy but also
material sciences. For example historian of science, Donald F Lach says:

Certain of the algebraic conceptions of Pythagoras, such as irrational numbers

and the theorem named for him may have been derived from Indian
mathematics. During the twelfth and thirteenth centuries the Hindu-Arabic
numerical and computational system as well as elements of Indian astronomy
certainly passed through the Islamic world into Europe, possibly by means of
Spanish intermediaries...The sine of trigonometry, which had first appeared in

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 Indian astronomical works was introduced into Europe through the translations of
the Arabic works. 13

Euro-centric bias and subsequent marginalization of India’s contribution to sciences is today

acknowledged as a problem in teaching the history of science by scholars. Even where the
contributions of other civilizations are taught the grand narrative tends to be Euro-centric. Clearly
the “eminent historians” who hold that astronomy and mathematics “were at a premium from the
Seventh century onwards when there was close interaction between scholars from Alexandria,
Baghdad, India and China”, seem to be insensitive to the flaw in this kind of discourse which a
philosopher of mathematics identifies:

Another distortion is Eurocentrism in the history of mathematics and that the

images of mathematics in society and throughout education. Many histories of
mathematics such as Eves (1953), promote a simplified Eurocentric view of its
development. Typically such accounts identify Mesopotamia and Egypt as the
sites of preliminary work that provided the raw materials for mathematics. Based
on this the flame of "real" mathematics was lit by the Ancient Greeks, kept alight
by the Arabs during the Dark Ages, until it was passed on like an Olympian torch,
and blazed anew in modern Europe and her cultural dependencies. ... There are
at least two ways of in which such accounts are wrong. First, all civilizations have
had a sophisticated mathematical basis and culturally embedded mathematics
(ethnomathematics) is to be found in all cultures covering every condition of the
globe. Second major contributions have been made that do not fit into the
Eurocentric scheme. For example, what is probably the single most important
conceptual innovation in the history of India was made in India with the invention
of the decimal place value system with zero. Less well known is the ground-
breaking work on infinite series conducted in Kerala in Southern India. Over a
hundred years before Europe caught up many of the key results attributed to and
named after the great mathematicians Gregory, Maclaurin, Taylor, Wallis,
Newton , Leibniz and Euler had already been discovered (Almedia & Joseph,
2004; Joseph, 1991; Pearce, n.d.).14

Every student of history learns the unproved thesis that the Alexandrian invasions brought zodiac
to India but how many Indian students even know the facts about knowledge transfusion from
East to West in not just ancient world even during the early decades of colonization which along
with capital drainage from colonized societies helped in the building of the western institutions of
science which we marvel today as an exclusively western phenomenon? Once again Joshi’s
attempt to reemphasize the technological achievements of ancient India as an inspiration
to move forward into the future stands fully vindicated by facts.

13
Donald F. Lach, Asia in the Making of Europe: A Century of Wonder : Book Three : The Scholarly Disciplines,
University of Chicago Press, 1994, p.407
14
Paul Ernest, New Philosophy of Mathematics, in Culturally Responsive Mathematics Education, Ed.Brian Greer,
Greer/Mukhopadhyay, Taylor & Francis, 2009, p.60

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 V
Ancient Indians: Hospitals to Plastic surgery – Did they have it or not?

Joshi: India knew plastic surgery, practised it for centuries and, in fact, it has become the basis
of modern plastic surgery. India also practised the system of inoculation against small pox
centuries before the vaccination was discovered by Dr. Edward Jenner.

“The Hindu” response: India had no practice of plastic surgery until modern times. Nor did India
know about vaccines.

The Facts: Perhaps here the “eminent historians” of the newspaper from
Madras can join issue equally with the Congress candidate from
Trivandrum as they do with Joshi. Sashi Tharoor writes:

Nor do scholars contest India's claim to have produced the first

surgeon, Susruta, whose methods (and tools) of surgery,
including plastic surgery and prostheses for amputees,
pioneered the field.15

Let us go for more scholarly view on the subject. The authors of the
authoritative book, “Great Ideas in the History of Surgery” state thus with
regard to this question:
This Indian method of
nose reconstruction The most outstanding achievements of Indian
illustrated in the surgery, however , are recorded in the chapters of
Gentleman Magazine
1794, was responsible lithotomy, laparotomy and plastic surgery...Although
for renewed interest in the question of reciprocal influence of Indian and
plastic surgery in
Europe. Western medicine in general has never been
completely answered, it is an established fact that
Indian plastic surgery provided the basic pattern for Western efforts
in this direction.16

In the case of vaccination, we do know that ancient Indians practiced a form

of small pox inoculation. The practice of band of medical men moving along
the villages of India during the spring and inoculating persons diagnosed
th
susceptible to smallpox has been documented in the eighteenth century. A 19 century
engraving of Indian
They are considered by modern medical researchers as “world’s first mobile mendicant: such
inoculation teams.”17 It should also be stated that the British banned the wandering mendicants
also served to
indigenous inoculation against smallpox in favor of vaccination.18 The disseminate medical
celebrated vaccination of Jenner (inoculation through cowpox) is definitely an knowledge throughout
improvement and more effective than the indigenous method. But the pre-British India.

principle is the same for both. Further the indigenous system was also decentralized.

15
Shashi Tharoor, India: From Midnight to the Millennium and Beyond, Arcade publishing, 2006 p.300
16
Leo M. Zimmerman, Ilza Veith, Great Ideas in the History of Surgery, Norman Publishing 1993, p.63
17
Donald R Hopkins, The greatest killer: smallpox in history, with a new introduction, University of Chicago Press, 2002
p.17
18
Darshan Shankar & Ram Manohar, Ayurveda Today - Ayurveda at the Crossroads, in Oriental Medicine: An Illustrated
Guide to the Asian Arts of Healing, (Ed. Jan Van Alphen, Jan Alphen, Anthony Aris, Mark De Fraeye, Fernand Meyer),
Serindia Publications, Inc., 1995, p.100

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So if anything here Joshi should be accused of understating the achievements and the
humanitarian nature of the institution of medicine in pre-British India. However “The Hindu”
critique of past-India’s achievements does not stop here. They also claim that Indians never had
an institution for health care. This was the claim they made next which we shall see in detail.

“There were no hospitals in ancient India”

Joshi: Fa-Hian, writing about Magadha in 400 AD, has mentioned that a well organised health
care system existed in India.

“The Hindu” response: The Chinese pilgrims visiting India — Fa Hien and Hsuan Tsang —
make a brief mention of sick persons being treated by having to fast for seven days and being
given some medicine. This was probably the treatment given to sick monks in monasteries. There
were no hospitals.

The Facts: The “eminent historians” as usual shove away the testimony of Chinese pilgrims and
speculate that the caring of sick by giving medicines were “probably …treatment…in
monasteries” and then authoritatively declare that there were no hospitals.

First let us see the “brief mention” of one of these Chinese pilgrims Fa-Hian who visited Indian
during the Gupta period and see for ourselves if there is anything that makes one thing if the
hospitals mentioned here were actually hospitals or “treatment given to sick monks in
monasteries” as claimed by the “eminent historians”:

People repair thither from all the provinces, and

the delegates whom the chiefs of the kingdoms This is the
maintain in the town have each established description by Fa-
Hian: Could he have
there a Medicine-house of happiness and virtue.
misidentified sick
The poor, the orphans, the lame, in short all the monks getting
sock of the provinces repair to these houses, treatment in
where they receive all that is necessary for their monasteries for
wants. Physicians examine their complaints; hospitals as claimed
they are supplied with meat and drink according by the “eminent
to expedience, and medicines are administered historians” of “The
Hindu”?
to them. Everything contributes to soothe them:
those that are cured go away of themselves.19

Clearly the “eminent historians” have trusted their readers not to verify the original passages.
Now let us look at the literary and Epigraphical evidence to see how the hospital services evolved
over a period of thousand years from before the Common Era. The second rock edict of Asoka
(272-232 BCE) claims the establishment of two kinds of healings –one for humans and another
for animals. Though many scholars interpret this to mean hospitals some dispute it.20 The Tamil
epic Chilapathikaram dated between 200-300 CE speaks of a Tamil society that honored Vedic

19
The Pilgrimage of Fa Hian, Published by Baptist Mission Press, 1848, p.255
20
Charles M. Leslie, Asian medical systems: a comparative study, Motilal Banarsidass, 1998, p.34

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Deities and built separate houses for diseased persons called "Ilanchi Mantram" where the
afflicted stayed and got healed of their diseases. 21

Supporting of health institutions evolved into a great virtue in South Indian culture.
Dr.Gurumurthy, archeologist from University of Madras points out that Chola records as old as
thousand years refer to the dispensary as Atulasalai or vaidya salai, (Atula or Vaidya meaning
medicine and salai meaning institution of charitable nature). He further points out that large
number of inscriptions speak of the establishment of such dispensaries in villages.22

The Thirumukkudal inscription (1067 CE) gives details

about a Chola hospital that had fifteen beds for the
treatment of patients. The inscription gives details
about the staff which include chief physician, surgeon,
two persons looking after the fetching and preparation
of medicinal herbs, two nurses for attending the
patients, a barber and a waterman and their salaries.

Apart from staff, provisions were also made for the

hospital infrastructure which included supply of food
According to the inscriptions in this for in-house patients, burning of lamps at night and
temple, thousand years before
attached to this temple was a 15-bed storing the prepared medicines.23 Kundavai – the
hospital. legendary sister of Rajaraja- I established a hospital
24
(Sundara Chola Vinnagar Athula Salai) at Thanjavur.
According to Malkapuram inscription (Andhra Pradesh) dated 1261 CE a Kakatiya king made
land donation for a maternity hospital.25

Yet in the face of such evidence the “eminent historians” asserted that there were no hospitals in
India prior to British.

21
Chilapathikaram, Puhar kanTam: Description of how the city celebrated Indra festival, 1:5:121
22
S. Gurumurthy, Medical Science and Dispensaries in ancient South India as gleaned from epigraphy, Indian Journal of
History of Sciences, Vol.5, No.1, 1970, p.77
23
Epigraphica Indica, Vol. XXI, No.38, p.220
24
T. Sundaramurthi, Varalarril Maruthuvam(Tamil), Chennai, 1978, pp.9-18
25
Journal of the Andhra Historical Research Society, Vol. IV, pp. 147-64

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 VI
Questioning the spread of Indian worldview to champion the cause of China?

Joshi: India’s worldview is known to have extended from Bamiyan/

Kandahar to Borobudur/ Indonesia on the one hand, and Sri Lanka
to Japan on the other. Imprints of Indian culture are found in some
other parts of the world as well.

“The Hindu” response: India’s world view did not extend from
Afghanistan to Indonesia. Hindus in south India knew nothing about
Bamiyan and those in north-western India knew nothing about
Borobudur. Nor was there any knowledge of Japan. There was some
knowledge of central Asia in the north-west of India, some
knowledge of south-east Asia in eastern and southern India and the
Cholas had contacts with Canton.
Worldview is not a term about
The Facts: One is astonished to find the way the “eminent geography. But the “eminent
historians” team of “The Hindu”
historians” of “The Hindu” have confused the term “worldview” with seems to have some problem
geographical knowledge. The American Heritage Dictionary of the in comprehending such terms.
English Language’s entry for Worldview (translation of German
Weltanschauung) defines the term thus:
The overall perspective from which one sees and interprets the world./A
collection of beliefs about life and the universe held by an individual or a group.

In this issue the verbal diatribe of the “eminent historians” flows from this
flawed understanding of the term.
Now let us take the case of Japan. Did the Indic world view reach
Japan? Zen the world famous Japanese Buddhism owes much to India
that in the authoritative volume “Complete Book of Zen” Wong Kiew Kit
dedicates a complete chapter to the title “The Spread of Zen from India”
where Wong lists 28 Buddhist patriarchs starting from Buddha to
Mahakasyapa through Nagarjuna to Bodhidharma.26 And as any pop-
spiritual Guru may say to you, Zen derives from Dhyan – very much an
Indian word.

Now let us see the validity of “some knowledge of south-east Asia” of the
Bodhidharma was “eminent historians” team of “The Hindu”. Scholar Milo Kearney in the book
from Kanchi. “The Indian Ocean in World History” gives an exhaustive extent of Hindu
influence in South East Asia:

The trading development had started in the pre-Gupta period, when Indian
merchants had crossed to South east Asia to obtain its gold. New cultural blends
resulted from mixture of Indian with indigenous influences. In the first century AD,
Kaundinya planted a Hindu settlement in Cambodia. His descendents were the
kings of the Khmer kingdom. Hindu civilization spread to Thailand in the second
century AD, where it was reinforced via India and Burma when in the fourteenth
century the Thai came to rule Thailand and Laos (from their capital Ayutthia,

26
Wong Kiew Kit, Complete Book of Zen, Tuttle Publishing, 2002, pp.63-75

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 named after Rama's capital, Ayodhya). A Shiva-and Buddha worshipping Hindu
dynasty was implanted in Champa (south Vietnam) in the late second century
AD. The Hindus colonized Borneo about AD 400 and dominated its society for
sometime. ...As late as the ninth century, East Indian merchant dynasties were
still ruling Java, Sumatra, Malaya and Cambodia. The cultural development
based on Gupta influence in Cambodia reached their height long after the Gupta
empire had ended. The island of Bali is still Hindu, a continuing tribute to the
strength of Indian commerce and cultural influence in this period.27

The reason this passage has been quoted at length here is because
one has to suspect ulterior motives in “The Hindu” minimizing the
historic cultural ties that India has with South East Asia.

As everyone knows, “The Hindu” has darkly transformed itself into a

strong pro-Chinese magazine and stands for the interests of China,
even at the expense of the interests of India. Today China has an
ambitious plan to dominate the Indian Ocean region by forming
strategic tie up with South East Asian countries (including Thailand
and Indonesia) and also with Sri Lanka and Pakistan.28 For China to
get a firm an emotional foothold in these nations Indian cultural
influence has to be minimized. So it is no wonder that The Hindu is
th th
Shiva: Vietnam 11 to 12 serving the Chinese interests in India itself by minimizing or belittling
century.
India’s historical ties with South East Asia.

Further the extent of Indian

influence on South East Asia
was not a one time
colonization or missionary
influence. Rather it was
continuous, organic and pan-
Indian. Amara Srisuchat,
director of Thailand’s national
museum points out the
following: the early image of
Vishnu from Chaiya, (5th
century CE) reflects influence
of South Indian tradition and Chinese strategy to contain India in the Indian Ocean:
another 8th century Vishnu Notice how this touches all South East Asian countries
from Thailand shows South that have historic and cultural association with India.
th Both China and “The Hindu” want to minimize or belittle
Indian influence of 7 century.
these ties to facilitate China to have a stranglehold on
A 10th century four-faced these nations and Indian Ocean.
Brahma from Thailand reflects
th
the same tradition as the 9 century Kashmiri Brahma sculpture from Avantipura. Nalanda served
as a model for Buddhist art in the 10-11th century. The triple-flexion (tribanga) image of Buddha in

27
Milo Kearney, The Indian Ocean in World History, Routledge, 2004, p.50
28
Gurpreet S. Khurana, China's 'String of Pearls' in the Indian Ocean and Its Security Implications, Strategic Analysis,
Volume 32, Issue 1 January 2008 , pp 1-39

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Nagapattinam29 served as a model for Sukhothai artisans in Thailand. Another important pinnacle
of Indian cosmological vision –the Dance of Siva which gained strong prominence during the
Chola period in the 12th century almost instantaneously has appeared in the sculptural scene of
30
Thailand.

Yet the “eminent historians” of “The Hindu” claim that there was only “some knowledge of south-
east Asia”. It is “some knowledge” and lot of ignorance indeed…in the worldview of “The Hindu”
team that is.

VII
The secular Humanism of Hindu civilization

Joshi: The belief in essential unity of mankind is a unique feature of Hindu thought. The Vedic
Rishi had also declared that Ekam Sad Viprah Bahudha Vadanti (truth or reality is one but wise
men describe it in different ways). This is essentially a secular thought in the real sense of the
term because it accepts that one can follow his own path to reach the ultimate. Hindus are well
known for their belief in harmony of religions.

“The Hindu” response: The notion of the secular was not known to the Hindus, as the secular
requires giving priority to the human being irrespective of his/her beliefs. Hindus were concerned
with establishing caste and sect. Only the Buddhists expounded a view that might be called
secular since they emphasised social ethics irrespective of other links. And Buddhists were
ousted by Hindus.

The Facts: That Buddhists were expounded secular view while Hindus were concerned only with
establishing caste and sect is a
falsifiable myopic view of Indian history.
The studies by none other than
R.S.Sharma on the fourth caste
category (the Shudras) in ancient India
showed that the Buddhist philosophy of
Ahimsa and Buddha's injunction to
monks to refrain from cultivation
resulted in peasants being relegated to
31
the Shudra Varna or the lowest caste.
Asoka pillar edicts also speak of Two of the greatest Buddhist achievements in India
restrictions on hunters and fishermen Nalanda University and Ajanta cave paintings had
who were forced to give up their Hindu patronage.
professions by the state authority
32
because of the religious belief of the king. This could hardly be construed as secular. As against
such state sponsored religious restriction, Hindu savants embraced the Dalits and elevated them

29
Incidentally the Buddha Vihara at Nagapattinam was patronized by Pallava and Chola kings who subscribed to Vedic
religion. The Vihara was pulled down by Jesuits with British support in 1867.
30
Amara Srisuchat, Art Objects and Architectures reflecting Indo-Thai cultural linkages. In Mapping connections Indo-Thai
historical and cultural linkages, Ed. Sachchidanand Sahai and Neeru Misra, Mantra 2006, pp.42-3
31
Debjani Ganguly , Caste, colonialism and counter-modernity: notes on a postcolonial hermeneutics of caste,
Routledge, 2005, p.94
32
Paul Williams, Buddhism: Buddhist origins and the early history of Buddhism in South and Southeast Asia, Taylor &
Francis, 2005,p.59

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to the rank of Divine.33 The caste system and untouchability were the result of state-building and
socio-economic exploitation as well as ritual-power group formation. Hence they are universal
social phenomena, in resource-scarce societies with restricted mobility. But the earliest
opposition to marginalization of people in society based on their birth or profession has been
voiced consistently by Hindu savants – from Sankara to Swami Vivekananda to Sri Narayana
Guru and Mahatma Gandhi. Atheism is also recognized by Hinduism as a valid path in quest of
truth. Hence seeing Hinduism as a civilizational basis of India and its secular nature is not wrong.

Further it is historically wrong to

say that Hinduism ousted
Buddhism. In fact the greatest
civilizational achievements of
Buddhism in India were achieved
under the patronage of Hindu
kings. Nalanda was patronized by
Gupta kings. Jesuit Indologist
Heras in his famous paper on the
royal patrons of Nalanda
Two of the greatest destructions against Buddhism in recent University, while commenting on
history were perpetrated by Maoism and pan-Islam: curiously
Kumara Gupta a Vaishnava
both the forces are supported by “The Hindu”
patron of the Buddhist university,
informs his English audience that
“such respect and esteem for Buddhism is not a strange thing in a Hindu monarch.”34 And
the famous Ajanta paintings were created under the patronage of the Ministers of Hindu Vakataka
dynasty.35 Perhaps “the eminent historians” would do well to read Ambedkar to discover who
“ousted” Buddhism from India. Dr. Ambedkar said that there could be no doubt that the fall of
Buddhism was due to the Arab invasions.36 He also condemned Chinese aggression over Tibet.

There is no need to shy away from the word Hindu. And there is no need to give away secular-
humanist ideals as enshrined in our constitution either. In fact there is no conflict between these
two stands. This is brought out wonderfully by none other than Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam along with
the Jain seer Acharya Mahapragya:

The underlying tenets of Indian civilization, which is termed as a Hindu society

cannot be easily defined…The Vedas and Smritis speak highly of equality and
brotherhood – Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam (One World One Family). The entire
world is one family is the motto of Vedic civilization. …What is the unique feature
of Indian civilization? Perhaps an emotional open heart and a tolerant mindset!
…The essential pluralism of Indian ethos explains the existence of many faiths in
Hindu religion as well as multiple indigenous versions of other major religions.
Not that there have not been lapses, deviations and even refusals, both in earlier
rimes and less forgivably, in recent times. But these are only aberrations. In the

33
Thirunavuckarasar Thevaram, 6.95.10
34
Fr. Heras, The Royal Patrons of the University of Nalanda, Journal of the Bihar and Orissa Research Society, Vol. XIV
1928 pp. 1-23
35
K.D.Bajpai, Five phases of Indian art,Rajasthan-Vidya Prakashan, 1991 p.73
36
B.R. Ambedkar: Writings and Speeches, vol.3, p.229

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 words of the sociologist Leela D’Souza the real enduring Indian is syncretic,
pluralistic and tolerant.37

Today the indigenous versions of all religions are threatened by virulent foreign versions
supported by alien funding and vote bank politics. So wishing that every faith living in India the
secular state, ancient civilization and pluralistic society, must take a leaf out of the eternal spiritual
ethos of India for a harmonious living, is not a sectarian or supremacist wish as “The Hindu” tries
to depict. Far from that it is the need of the hour.

Thus an objective analysis of “The Hindu” and its team of “eminent historians” make Joshi’s stand
vindicated.

We know we cannot expect even the bare minimum honesty from “The Hindu” as to apologize to
its readers for publishing such a non-factual rhetoric. But the least that “The Hindu” can do is
refrain from peddling its own prejudiced ignorance for scholarly perspective and thus not insult
the intelligence of its readers.

A Hope for “The Hindu”

We were once daily readers of The Hindu; we grew with it. But today we have painfully eschewed
it. The reason is that we perceive in “The Hindu” a bias against India and a disregard for basic
humanity. We see it tow a Marxist party-line towards China and we see it support genocidal
regimes.

Nevertheless we sincerely hope that this is a passing phase of perversion for the newspaper.

We also hope that “The Hindu” – an age old institution, would redeem itself from the abyss of the
ethics-less journalism and anti-national treason into which it has fallen. May “The Hindu” like the
phoenix once again rise from this present state of degeneracy and function again as a truly
national newspaper as envisioned by the original founders of the newspaper.

Jai Hind

Indic Vision for Truth

37
Acharya Mahapragya and APJ Abdul Kalam, The Family and the Nation, Harper Collins India 2008, p.77 & pp.85-6

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