Quotes About India

Srinagar, there was a grave of a Christian soldier from Travancore, which had the Vedic swastika and a verse from the Quran inscribed on it. There could be 'no more poignant and touching symbolof the essential oneness and unity of India'.61

However, by the end of 1947, P.C. Joshi found his line challenged by the radical faction of the CPI. They claimed that the freedom that India had obtained was false—'Ye Azaadi Jhooti Hai', the slogan went—and asked that the party declare an all-out war against the Government of India.

The Constitution of India recognizes twenty-two languages as 'official'. The most important of these is Hindi, which in one form or another is spoken by upwards of 400 million people.

I cannot leave so important a question as the protection of my people to conventions and misunderstandings. The Mahatma is not an immortal person . . . There have been many Mahatmas in India whose sole object was to remove untouchability and to elevate and absorb the Depressed Classes but every one of them have failed in their mission. Mahatmas have come and Mahatmas have gone. But untouchables have remained as untouchables.

The plural, inclusive, idea of India has three enemies. The best known is the notion of a Hindu Rashtra, as represented in an erratic fashion by the Bharatiya Janata Party and in a more resolute (or more bigoted) manner by the Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh, the Vishwa Hindu Parishad, the Bajrang Dal and other associated organisations.

While economics played a role, so did individuals, and one individual in particular. The official history underestimated the personal charisma of Mohandas K. Gandhi. His name, and his methods, fired the popular imagination. It was he who conceived of and led the campaign against the Rowlatt Act, he who conceived and led non-cooperation, he, who, by making common cause with the Muslims on the Khilafat, brought India's two major communities together against the Raj.

No event of any importance in India is complete without a goof-up. In this case, it was relatively minor. When, after the midnight session at the Constituent Assembly, Jawaharlal Nehru went to submit his list of cabinet ministers to the governor general, he handed over an empty envelope. However

They assured him that the president was bound to act with 'the aid and advice of the Council of Ministers and cannot act independently of that advice'. As they saw it, the position of the president of India was even weaker than that of the British monarch.

In India, credit for the victory was shared by countless mostly unnamed soldiers and a single specific politician – the prime minister. Mrs Gandhi was admired for standing up to the bullying tactics of the United States, and for so coolly planning the dismemberment of the enemy. Her parliamentary colleagues went overboard in their salutations, but even opposition politicians were now speaking of her as 'Durga', the all-conquering goddess of Hindu mythology.

The heart hoped that India would survive, but the head worried that it wouldn't. The place was too complicated, too confusing – a nation, one might say, that was unnatural. In truth, ever since the country

the most powerful enemy of the idea of India now is the Indian state.

Sir Jadunath Sarkar

The report first carefully outlined the arguments for and against linguistic states. It urged a 'balanced approach' which recognized 'linguistic homogeneity as an important factor conducive to administrative convenience and efficiency' yet not 'as an exclusive and binding principle, over-riding all other considerations'. Among these other considerations were, of course, the unity and security of India as a whole.33

There are four varnas, with the former 'Untouchables' constituting a fifth (and lowest) strata. Into these varnas fit the 3,000 and more jatis, each challenging those, in the same region, that are ranked above it, and being in turn challenged by those below.

Nehru was a well-read and widely travelled man. Through his travels and readings, he arrived at a synthesis of socialism and liberalism that he thought appropriate to his country. In other words, the political beliefs he came to profess – and invited the people of India to share – were his own.

In March 1950 Sukumar Sen was appointed chief election commissioner.

Ramachandra Guha

But the history of independent India has remained a field mostly untilled. If history is 'formally constituted knowledge of the past', then for the period since 1947 this knowledge practically does not exist.

nobody in India will love me for the award about the Punjab and Bengal and there will be roughly 80 million people with a grievance who will begin looking for me. I do not want them to find me . . .

India incorporates a greater variety of religions (whether born in its soil or imported) than any other nation in human history.

By 1888 the British were so solidly established in India that they could anticipate, if not a thousand-year Raj, at least a rule that extended well beyond their own lifetimes.

Had it not been for the groundswell of support by the people of India, we would not have seen such a huge exercise of demonetisation bounce off without a single riot or a single law and order issue.

I was born and brought up in Canada but I always wanted to come to India and act.

The Modi government believes that the industrialist, the capitalist, has to pay for the assets of the government which belong to the people of India.