Abstract

In this paper I trace various uses of the Aryan hypothesis by different groups of Indian and non-Indian scholars of Indian history in order to show how this hypothesis has taken several forms as it was put to use in the construction of Indian identity. These constructions of Indian identity will show that India is suffering a pathology of identity in response to the modern and postmodern stresses it is undergoing. India is not alone in its present postmodern pathology. We see the same phenomenon in various parts of the world with the conservative and religious revivals in the Islamic world, Israel and the United States.