The authors argue that the chain of events which they describe is the end-product of a century's effort to convert Hindus into a 'proper' modern nation and a conventional ethnic majority. Simultaneously, the effort is equally to turn the followers of other Indian faiths into well-behaved ethnic minorities and nationalities. The American model of a 'melting pot' is being imposed with the expectation that it will dissolve India's primordial identities. A society which has for centuries been a salad bowl of (...) diverse communities, each identifiably different but constituting parts of a whole, is being forced to conform to the pattern of a 'proper' nation-state. (shrink)

Philosophy as Samvada and Svaraj discusses Daya Krishna and Ramchandra Gandhi’s respective intellectual contributions and speculates how one might take forward the work of the two persons who were among the most brilliant minds of our times. Both Daya Krishna and Ramchandra Gandhi emphasized freedom and autonomy of thought and upheld the importance of samvada, somewhat inadequate in its English translation as dialogue. And both of them were philosophers concerned with how philosophy might seek its svaraj, free from the orientalist (...) hold of the religious, the colonial crippling of indigenous languages and institutions and the structures and categories of un-freedom that continue to haunt inhabitants of West and non-West. Philosophy must involve samvada—an open dialogue and intimate encounter between self and other. Both philosophers experimented with these concepts and were enormously creative. This book is a testament not only to the core values of philosophy, but also to how these values can be carried forward by new weaves of tradition and modernity. (shrink)