Independence Day Special: Resilience of a Great Nation
Indian Independence is a reminder of the resilience of a Great Nation - a civilisation carrying its stories across Countless millennia
Today, India is celebrating its 79th Independence Day. I have never felt this special about the occasion before; part of the reason is this project, which has brought me closer to my own country. For my research, I listened to classical and semi-classical music, and I must confess that I didn’t have the ear for it at first. But once I began to understand a little of Hindustani classical music, its different ragas, and the emotions they carry, I felt as though I had discovered an entirely new universe.
In 1915, after returning to India from South Africa, Gandhi ji embarked on a journey across his homeland on the advice of his mentor, Gopal Krishna Gokhale. From his birthplace in Porbandar to the Shantiniketan in West Bengal, where he met Rabindranath Tagore, Gandhi observed that there was alot about this country that he had not seen or knew about.
His travels brought him to the Banaras Hindu University in Varanasi, where an audience of princes, scholars, and noblemen awaited. In that sacred city, Mahatma Gandhi’s words froze the audience:
“It is a matter of deep humiliation and shame for us that I am compelled this evening, under the shadow of this great college in the sacred city, to address my countrymen in a language that is foreign to me.”
I am not suggesting that India’s fight for independence was a romantic yearning for a bygone age. Far from it, it was, in many ways, a political and economic necessity rather than a purely sentimental pursuit. Yet in every voice I have read, from Gandhi to Tilak, there is a shared conviction that India is a civilisation carrying its stories across countless millennia.
Perhaps Jawaharlal Nehru expressed this most clearly in The Discovery of India:
We can never forget the ideals that have moved our race, the dreams of the Indian people through the ages, the wisdom of the ancients, the buoyant energy and love of life and nature of our forefathers, their spirit of curiosity and mental adventure, the daring of their thought, their splendid achievements in literature, art and culture, their love of truth and beauty and freedom, the basic values that they set up, their understanding of life's mysterious ways, their toleration of other ways than theirs, their capacity to absorb other peoples and their cultural accomplishments, to synthesize them and develop a varied and mixed culture; nor can we forget the myriad experiences which have built up our ancient race and lie embedded in our sub-conscious minds.