The connotation Indian

This article intends to address the connotation ‘Indian’, which is confused today, due to many factors.

India in 21st century has chiefly incorporated and implemented western policies in economics, politics, education, religion, judiciary, legislative and executive systems. People from all walks of life have unknowingly, engrossed deeply into the existing western thought system or western life style. The defence mechanism employed by people herein to defend their incapability to think beyond western thought system is the labelling of this trend as ‘convenience’ or ‘globalisation’. When there is so much of volunteer or in-volunteer indulgence in the western policies and influence from western life style in every mundane activity, why people don’t consider themselves as fanatic westerners?, or regard themselves as the promoters and propagandists of western thoughts? Factually, Indians living in India are true westerners! Alas, with this kind of self orientation to west, people in India, tend to feel that to speak about the better side of India is fanaticism or saffornization.

Well, the obvious question is, ‘is there an Indian way of living or Indian way of executing variety of jobs? The answer is yes. But for now, my contention is ‘if one just stays in India or eats Indian cuisine in his/her mundane life or wears ethnic wear on ethnic days, his/her connection with the native Indian traditions, customs, culture or heritage is not established and flourished in one’s life, in its true form. The next obvious question would be what is the significance and necessity of connecting with one’s own native traditions, customs, culture and heritage? This question in today’s context deserves a crude answer- ‘people when it comes to inheriting money, wealth, land or any other form of property from their ancestors, readily and daringly claim it as rights and even go to court if situation demands, and why not life skills and some unique vocational skills, the country possessed in the past? Now let me give you a refined answer- ‘every individual speaks of an identity’, without knowing the true meaning of it. Identity is not just one’s talents, traits, skills and the materials he/she possesses. Identity also means ‘an individual’s identification with one’s native country, region, community and family or on the whole a culture, which can pave way for a harmonious living’. In such a case, where can we locate that kind of a connection in today’s Indians’ with their nation or culture, which is a rich treasure house of knowledge and experience? If an Indian cannot connect with his/her country’s glorious past, then his/her identity as an Indian, today would be superficial and his/her identification with the country would be only with the current corrupt political system, pothole filled roads, hilarious and ridiculous bollywood or at the most the pathetic security system which invites Kasab and co. The second salient factor to substantiate the requirement or necessity to connect to one’s culture or identify with one’s tradition is the genetic factor! Genes as understood in simplest terms by most of us, is a factor which in it has the potential to pass on certain psycho-physical elements to one individual from his/her ancestors. Our ancestors (Indians) are people who over a period of time experimented or after a trial and error method, laid out set of practical principles, to make this world a better place to live. As such principles are based on experiments; it is possible to infer their ‘committing of blunders’ in the process. Those mistakes ‘if’ can be recognized, analyzed and rectified by us today in an unbiased manner; we can evacuate evil to a large extent in the society. The above said statement doesn’t in any way rule out the existence of evil in the earlier societies, as evil is a perennial philosophy. But the implicit is the evil was less and most evil doers in the past were aware of their evil ways and its bitter consequences on the society. But today evil doers assume committing evil as a social status! In good old days, a blunder used to be a blunder, whoever committed it. These days depending on the political affiliations, group affinity and caste considerations define the blunder! So, rectification of past mistakes and taking a firm and assertive decision, will help an individual to evolve into a better human being. So learning from our culture is not alone from some vocational skill’s perspective, but also from life skill’s perspective, which is an inevitable aspect of life. This idea of experimentation and triggering one’s curiosity for a proper cause is available in one’s genes and has to be made optimally use of.

If a student of Indology like me with reverence to Indian thought system proposes an Indian thought, an Indian life style or Indian identity, the first reaction from people would be negation or negotiation.

Negation is pre-dominantly seen and it is mostly on some illogical grounds. Whereas, negotiation leads to two conventional answers, among which one is an escapism route from Indian thought process and the other is a complaint against Indian thought process.

I will start with the complaint first and then go the escapists rich chicken-heartedness and coward-some approach. The complaint against Indian thought is the exploitation of Shudras by Brahmins some centuries ago and even today in some remote corners of the nation. This complaint has nothing to do with Indian thought, but has everything to do with Indians who lived under this culture? We see many children who drink alcohol, consume drugs and smoke and still would have taken birth in a very decent and prestigious family background. So whom will you shift the blame upon- ‘the family in which such children were born or the children for having been influenced by their own whims and fantasies’? If in this context some people influenced from western life style, feel alcohol and drugs gives them social status and doing it once/regularly is good and then it is a moot point upon which I wouldn’t go deep into. Coming back, Indian thought system is not just all about Brahmana, Kshatriya, Vaishya and Shudra! Indian thought system goes just beyond these four words! Indian thought system is not about some fuzzy, senseless and unscientific customs the natives have developed. When I mention fuzzy, senseless and unscientific customs, I also wish to mention here strongly that there exists handful of scientific and meaningful customs! The meaning of it dawns upon a person, when he/she attempts to know it from right sources.

After ruling out that the four words Brahmana, Kshatriya, Vaishya and Shudra as not the sum and substance of Indian thought system, now it is essential to tell what else is Indian thought system?

There are gold mines on which we Indians stand and yet we don’t know about it or perhaps don’t want to know about it! See on what we are standing ignorantly and what and why we have to dig to unearth them.

• Natya-Shastra = A discipline to deal with Theaters and Emotions

• Kavya Shastra = A discipline to deal with Poetry and Prose

• Jyotishya Shastra = A discipline to deal with Astronomy & Astrology

• Bhoogola Shastra = A discipline to deal with Geography. The word Bhoo-gola means earth (bhoo) is round (gola). This piece of knowledge was known to Indians even before 16th century Europeans told this to world from Apollo.

• Kama Shastra = A discipline to deal with Sex/Inter Course

• Nyaya Shastra = A discipline to deal with Logic

• Meemamsa Shastra = A discipline to deal with Rituals

• Sheeksha Shastra = A discipline to deal with Phonetics & Phonology

• Vriksha-Ayurveda Shastra = A discipline to deal with Botany

• Dhatu Shastra = A discipline to deal with Metallurgy

• Artha Shastra = A discipline to deal with Economics & Politics

• Yantra Shastra = A discipline to deal with Machines

• Chandas Shastra = A discipline to deal with Prosody

• Vedanata Shastra = A discipline to deal with Para-normal Sciences and Spirituality

• Vyakarna Shastra = A discipline to deal with Grammar & Linguistics

• Ayurveda Shastra = A discipline to deal with Health and Well-being

• Bhagavadgita and Yoga-sutra = A discipline to deal with mind and beyond mind

• Agama/vastu-shastra = A discipline to deal with construction and every single temple in India till almost 1950 is extremely scientific and every single brick laid and every stone placed had a reason!

Read the books Pride of India and Science in India (both published by Samskrita bharathi) for more information, regarding the development of Physics and other disciplines of physical-science in India. Unfortunately, these developed sciences are not further researched and has lead to the stagnation of our knowledge system or downfall of the whole culture.

Aforesaid list is just tip of an ice berg. The list goes on and on. In this list some knowledge systems were/are more advanced than the current existing system. But, certainly, none of them are obsolete. But why do still people in India say all Indian scriptures are just spiritual or it is all about ‘Hindu’ religion? Is it because of Samskritam/Sanskrit? Language is only a mode of communication. Just because I have made this write up in English do I become Christian? If I had written this in Urdu, would I have been a Muslim? Samskritam or Sanskrit was a nicely crafted scientific language; by pronouncing it one would create health for himself/herself. The whole idea of scientific temperament behind a language is a hard nut to crack and harder a thought to assimilate for the current generation. Hope they will attempt to know the scientific temperament of a language, once Harvard or Oxford publishes it!

Today the world speaks of scientific analysis of anything and everything or calls it in the terms of objectifying and standardizing everything. Well, For Indians science was not a syllabus to be studied in a text book with theorems and hypothesis! Rather it was an approach to life! Scientific temperament is what Indians spoke about and not just science in terms of laboratories and theories! Scientific temperament meant curiosity. How much productive-curiosity do we see in students and adults today? Can the education which we have borrowed from west develop curiosity? How can it? I doubt! There is so much of spoon feeding at every level these days and education is merely a procedure in which passing chosen subjects in an examination is the ultimate objective? Indian’s science was not confined to just worldly matters, but was also concerned with the spiritual ideas, wherein the body turns to be a laboratory and an instrument to test and experiment. Curiosity lead them to know about the inner most layer of their personality called ‘consciousness’ by psychologists, ‘energy’ by physicists or ‘Atman/soul’ by philosophers. Consciousness, energy or Atman is same irrespective of gender, age, complexion caste and other human made superficial divisions. For those who cannot go beyond the ‘seeing is believing’ notion, the Vedas catered their senses with physical sciences also. So there is no pressure that one has to forcibly bear and accept the idea of spirituality.

Now let us come to the escapism route most Indians resorts to. For most Indians, it is globalisation which is more important and not just the Indian thoughts which according to them are though good, are country specific and religion specific or just not contemporary. If at all one speaks too much about the richness which existed in the past, one says, going with the time under the banner of globalization brings about peace, joy and is more sensible. The whole notion, Indian thoughts are religious and country specific is a biased and prejudiced one. Most advanced researches and most scriptures were revealed to the world, even before there was a geographical set up called India. India is a recent concept. Hindu became a religion only after the birth of Jesus and Allah! Till then Krishna, Rama and many other virtuous human beings who were in the later periods of history were glorified as Gods were just Human beings with extra capabilities! They were glorified as Gods, when people couldn’t see around them human beings with such sublimated states of existence. People with high sublimated emotions become Rama and Krishna! Vivekananda, Ramakrishan Paramahamsa, Ramana Maharshi, Aurobindo, Nisargadatta Maharaj and many other Sufi saints also have reached such states and have declared the same quality of truth as told by Rama or Krishna. So Indian thought system is not religious, but universal. IF THERE IS ANYTHING UNIQUELY INDIAN, THEN IT IS ESSENTIALLY UNIVERSAL. The other reason for the glorification of Rama and Krishna, was the invasions which happened on Indians, not just for plundering the wealth here, but also for the religion based intrusions and encroachments.

The ignorance and the attitude with which most Indians speak about globalization is really a sorry state of affair. This obsession with globalisation is a western super-imposition on the east. If at all the west speaks of globalization, why then there is no acknowledgement of Chankya in the west as a role model to the field of economics and politics? Aren’t his contributions worth recognition? If somebody says his ideas are outdated, I would argue that the same is the condition, with the ideas of Socrates and Aristotle. But the fact is Chankya’s thoughts are practical and feasible at least, in a nation like India. Why Abraham Lincoln, Adolf Hitler, Roosevelt, George Washington and other few westerners are always referred to as great politicians and why no great Indians like Shivaji or Maharana Pratap are found in such lists? There are names of Socrates, Aristotle, Descartes, Lockes and many others everywhere but not a single Indian is referred to, why? Why JC Bose (Botanist), Swami Vivekananda, Ramana Maharshi, Aurobindo, Ramakrishna Paramahamasa, (All great virtuous and spiritual masters) Sushruta & Charaka (Pioneers in medical science) Aryabhatta, Bhaskaracharya, Bodhayana, Madhwacharya, Pingala and many other mathematicians are not frequently spoken about in the name of Globalization? Why Indian personality’s contributions are left out in this so called Globalization? Indians do not even know that every year ‘Engineers Day’ is celebrated to remember Sir. M. Vishweshwarriah for his achievements in the field of engineering! But all children are taught from the society they dwell in about Steve Jobs and Bill Gates. We need to celebrate world ignorance day!

There is so much of importance to western music and why not to Indian classical music and Indian instruments in the name of globalization? If Indian instruments should be mellifluous, then there should be fusion (which is utter confusion) with western instrument. If flute or veena or any other instruments are individually played, there are no spectators! Why M S Subbulakshmi or Zakir Hussain is not listened by major Indian youth population? Backstreet boys and other band are role models to the Indian youth society. Now let us come to the scientific analysis of the aforesaid lines quickly without being just emotional about Indian knowledge system. Bharat-natya, Kuchipudi, Odissi and other forms of arts wherein regulated movement of body was scientifically taught for ages is being neglected by Indians. Whereas, western dance which is inclusive of some epileptic movements or which is all about unregulated epileptic movements is more adorable. How can one’s personal choice of music and dance be so unscientific and yet seek validation of the rituals and the Indian tradition which is scientific, as clearly shown above. Moreover, a thorough study of the Indian tradition is required and the study of the same should be done at least for 6-7 years to know the nuances of the same.

So, is this what we term globalisation? Fitting everything Indian for the convenience of west or in better terms, fitting whatever west wants from the east to western perspective or western audience is globalization. America wanted Yoga and it came back to India in the most diluted form (Dilution alone can be a topic for discussion! Yoga today is equated to Asana! If someone says I practice Yoga, it means he/she practices Asanas. But to Indians for centuries Yoga never meant Asanas. Yoga is a holistic system which deals with body, mind and consciousness. Asana is part of Yoga and Yoga is not all about Asanas! Let us now discuss about a few other dilutions. In India, music was a pure and pristine art, which invited appreciation and upliftment of a singer and also the upliftment of those who listen to music. Music was an instrument to evolve into a better human being. But today due to the influence of west, music is just a source of entertainment and it has nothing beyond it. When entertainment is given more emphasis, entertainer becomes vital! So the implicit is ‘best entertainer’ and the explicit is the best among the group, which shows the cut-throat competition temperament! So the best entertainer by any means can entertain the audience and it need not have any therapeutic effect, as found in Indian ragas. Indian thought system doesn’t believe in the best singer concept, because there cannot be two singers who can be alike in their ways of singing. Nobody can replicate or duplicate art! This is what I call dilution! The west accepts anything Indian, if it is convenient with the whole idea! But why do we have to and for what and whom do we have to budge and allow the original art to be diluted? Why re-importation?) and in a process called re-importation. Indians so gladly cuddled the art and in every village people speak of Yoga. Is this what is globalization? The western policy what we see today in the name of globalization is ‘all are equal, but some are more equal’!

There is one more conventional thought that people are speaking all over India about the changes which have started to happen positively. They say- ‘Indians are looking back at their own culture’. But I will warn you friends, ‘the so called changes we are witnessing are from that typical western lens’. I will remind all readers once again anything re-imported will come in the most diluted form!

When I posed all these questions or say, proposed all these ideas to a known person, he smartly answered- “The current India is choosing a way of life that makes it wealthy. It's not the strongest or the most intelligent, but, the only one who adopts will survive. I believe India mostly changed when MNCs started offering jobs, the unemployed India found an opportunity and adopted to survive, we started following Americans & Europeans. We started mocking their culture and learning their language. I don't think this would have happened if India would have looked after its youth population. If tomorrow we have to follow the Chinese then we will. Similarly if the world thinks Hinduism is the right way to live then let it be so. It's not right to say we have to stick to our culture and follow it to the end of the world. Rules are meant to be broken and guidelines are meant to be updated”

Well, I love the idea of judiciously or discerningly adopting, but not the idea of ‘converting’! I love the idea of Indians one day dumping US, if it loses its ‘super-power tag’ and following China, for its new found ‘super-power tag’ (if)! Well the speaker was so certain, that India would never attain that tag! How would it with Indians around merged in a thick layer of complacency and money-mindedness?

The logic here behind the distinction- ‘adoption and conversion’ is- ‘Is it good to accept a neighbouring lady as mother just because she knows to cook two extra dishes well, than my mother does’? My mother may not cook those two dishes, as deliciously as the neighbouring lady does, but she has in her the capability to keep me healthy for years, as she has done hitherto and she has more to offer than two dishes!

We enthusiastically learn Chinese, if we need to and we learnt US/UK English, when we wanted to! Those Indians enjoyed relished and cherished Harry Potter, but didn’t learn Samskritam/Sanskrit to read their own culture? Our identity which is concealed in Ramayana and Mahabharatha is still looked as religious text books. Why isn’t Panchatantra picked over Harry Potter, which has in it more values and good stories? Is this mentality good?

But, one question still remains without an answer. Have MNCs brought a balance and harmony in the society? Money and technology are not the only elements which signify a productive and progressive society.

The other escapism route adopted by many Indians is- ‘we have to witness all cultures’. People in most cultures go through their own cultures at the outset and then go on to read other cultures slowly. But in Indian context we learn, adopt, follow, emulate western culture and still say we need to know all cultures. But do we ever say that there is something I need to see and learn from my own culture first! How many know about the Vedas, Mahabharatha, Ramayana, Puranas and many other disciplines I have listed above? First become native and then become global and part of globalization.

Well I am not pejorative in evaluating globalization. Globalization is acceptably good when we can have respect for our culture and our thoughts too.

The more we show other countries that we are weak and our life is all about survival, they demoralize us more and threaten us. But if we are ready to ‘face the brutes’, the scenario might change. For this we require a strong knowledge base and not people who are intellectual bankrupts, like the employees in call centres and BPOs. Places like BPOs breed complacency and ignorance at the highest level. In what way an employee in a BPO setup is an asset to the society? Can they think independently to bring about a positive change in the society and take society towards well-being? More than 60% of Indian population have less interest in studies or seeking knowledge as they find a comfort level in their companies and the salary they receive. This ‘half-baked comfort’(A wholesome comfort leads man towards pain nullified happiness) is cancerous.

Today in India we have very good human resource and extremely intellectual people. Unfortunately the intellectual’s energies are not harnessed in a proper direction and all measures are taken by people in India and those intellectuals, is to survive and secure life and nothing else. The society is deteriorating day by day, as the society is focusing on survival, which is an extreme animal instinct. Human life lies beyond survival. We might have dearth in natural resources and it might be impossible to live independently. But is there an attempt to live independently by making optimum utilization of the existing human resources? And after all ‘independence’ is what everybody seeks!

We shall shift now to the next view an Indian subscribes to and exhibits ‘to defend his love for west’. India over centuries has developed thoughts by borrowing a lot from Roman and Greek culture. So why follow antagonism or why be antagonistic, which means Indicating opposition or resistance? Eastern thoughts versus Western thoughts? Further, to distil and know what is Indian and what is not Indian is difficult and hence let us live with the idea of ‘Globalisation’. Enough has been written about Globalisation. But now, we will have to say a few more things from the Indian perspective and discuss at the first place- ‘if at all the idea of antagonism is Indian or western’? India gave the world a message through Rigveda, “Let knowledge come from all directions” and with such a background, how can one even expect Indians to be the pioneers of an idea like antagonism? But unfortunately, today with the idea of patenting dominating in West, antagonism has become very essential and inevitable. Many westerners who lived in India, studied the thought process developed here and translated many works found in Indian literature and other disciplines into English! When they did so, they intentionally with crooked mindset just ignored to acknowledge that ‘their new work or new concept was borrowed from east’. Structuralism and many other works carried out in West stands out as an example to prove their cheap mentality. And see how the same west speaks in the name of globalization ‘bringing together all knowledge under one umbrella’ and still are obsessed with ‘patenting ideas’. Why did they patent Yoga and many other medicinal herbs? People who say it is difficult to distinguish knowledge into Indian and western are those people who live on the principle of profit! They will like west today and it is marked with excessive eagerness, because they are able to generate wealth, by working for west and if one day the whole world turns towards India and if these are forced to look at India, they would shamelessly see India as a source of major income and praise it! They are people who live on the principle, ‘I don’t have permanent friends or permanent enemies, but all I have is people for profit’.

Some Indians are more or less extremely negative about what they have to see about Indian past. They say pornography to homosexual activities, everything was seen in India and yet what makes India a special country? As discussed earlier evil existed in all times. In the Indian thought system, sex was neither a taboo nor a holy act, but it was a dutiful and a responsible act of a citizen who is married. An inter course between two should happen only with the permission and such an inter-course leads to the gifting to the society a responsible child. Now let us get into the ‘evil’ of homosexual activities or pornography! Anything in Indian thought done for the sake of pleasure is evil. When it is done for the sake of pleasure, it is many a times done at the cost of something or someone! Pleasure leads to addiction This eventually leads to the breakage of the system or an imbalance in the system! In Indian thought system, every work executed should be with duty consciousness and not with profit-orientation. But today profit and pleasure are the centre words around which everything happens and one can witness the amount of downfall and imbalance in the society. Well ‘pleasure’ ‘happiness’ and ‘bliss’ are three words with different meanings and these can be explained in detail in a separate context. But for now let us conclude that pleasure seeking mindset breeds evil in the society (Pleasure is momentary happiness (infatuation), happiness emerges by being individually vibrant and socially productive. And bliss is a spiritual happiness).

People argue about the Vedic Practices of sacrificing Animals as illogical and rubbish, without knowing the truth! Especially scientists obsessed with 'Scientific Analysis' or 'Standardization' or 'Seeing is Believing Principle', are against the Vedas as they didn't understand it or never attempted to understand it! IS IT OK?

* To kill animals in the course of experiments and the preparations of vaccines, serums, antibiotics and other medicines, as per ALLOPATHIC SYSTEMS (Purely Western)!

* To show so much of cruelty to the animal-beings to satisfy the craze of modern society, for possessing soft leather fur hand, bags, caps, coats, purses, belts and other trappings?

* To torture monkeys, cats, dogs, guinea pigs, rats and other animals in the experiments involved in the production of lotions, shampoos etc, to make them safe for humans.

* To inflict miseries on unfortunate victims to cater to the palate of humans (Lean meat, Protien rich meat, frog legs, hatcheries, roasting/skinning live birds, animals etc.)

* Poaching of Rhinoceros, Tigers, Elephants and other endangered exotic species for aphrodisiac, medicinal decorative and artistic purposes?

This is only a cursory glance! There is no sense of remorse for the same modern psyche, which complains about the Vedic rishi's psyche! Vedic rishis' psyche can be understood by reading the Vedas and not by inferring and assuming to one's convenience, to bloat one's ego!

It is important to read thoroughly about anything we critically speak about.

Absolute non-injury can remain only a Utopia!

Last but not the least, a view which I heard from a friend of mine. Everything has to come to a saturation point and once it comes, people will automatically get back to normalcy. Every time I see a smoker, I wonder why that smoker hasn’t learnt from the society in which smokers have seen that so called saturation point called ‘cancer’. Men learn not quickly and by the time a saturation point would have come, the society would be a hell, wherein air would be polluted beyond redemption, rain would have stopped visiting earth and so drinking water would be snatched away by thieves at gunpoint and earth would be a barren land, wherein people would eat synthetic food and wear clothes which would never have been washed! The view they share indirectly says- ‘change is a slow process’! Hopefully, being slow won’t keep us low! But being slow for a positive change keeps us low is the fact I can convincingly say.

And all those Indians who have not much to say about the article, will say I love to be Indian in a pure and pristine form, but the system and society doesn’t allow me to be so. And what if system allows? They would then say I don’t have time! After providing my insights on most views above, do you think I would stop here abruptly without giving an answer to the aforesaid two important questions? To those who are caught in the clutches of system and time, look ‘the problem is not with the external system, but with the internal system and mechanism’. The question is not time, but the will power!

Keywords: What is truly being Indian?, Is there something called Indian-ness? Harmful effects of Globalization, Today do we see true Globalization?, Is Indian respected in the name of Globalization? Are Indians coward? Are Indians Confused? Do Indians know about their culture? Have Indians cheated themselves by reading improper history of their own country?