A nation that has no history of its own has nothing in this world. … We have our own history exactly as it ought to have been for us. … But that history has to be rewritten. It should be restated and suited to the understanding and ways of thinking which our men have acquired in the present age through Western education.” – Swami Vivekananda, The Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda, Vol. 9, Advaita Ashrama Calcutta, 5365-6
Finally, after a resilient and resurgent approach of Bharat for months together, belligerent China has to accept the status-quo on the Line of Actual Control on the Ladakh-Tibet border. Though Bharatiya forces on the ground will have to be cautious while executing the agreement, considering the previous experiences, it is a significant breakthrough on the Eastern Front. More important than that, we have to move beyond the two or two and half front war, as conventionally talked about and prepare ourselves for the multi-front war from within and outside. This multi-front war is waged against civilisationally democratic Bharat not just on borders or with the Armed Forces but at multiple levels and diverse spaces.
The first war is, of course, on the borders where we have to be vigilant. After losing the battles through infiltration, Pakistan, again propped up by China, is on the back-foot even in the war of narratives developed over the period around Jammu-Kashmir. Looking for the new frontier, a revival of separatist mindset in Punjab seems to be the strategy.
The next level of war is being played in the social-media space. The ongoing spat with Twitter, the micro-blogging app, is not just about the present dispensation but about the history, present and future of Bharat. Data and narratives are used to occupy the mind-space and shape the national narratives by these tech-giants with ideological bias, and supra-national arrogance is mindboggling. The way ‘twitter India’ is defying the Government orders on the fake-narratives peddled through particular handles has exposed this platforms’ mindset. A tech company is undermining the law of the land and promoting the divisive and violent culture against Bharat. This war is not just with one company but the attitude of multinational-tech companies, who create wealth by using our data and spread hatred against the indigenous models of wealth creation.
The third level of war is more complex and long-term that is in the realm of intellectual space. The network of Non-Government Organisations (NGOs), Media Houses, Academic Institutions and thinks tanks have been working tirelessly to propagate the ‘Foreign Destructive Ideology’ (FDI) as pointed out by Prime Minister Narendra Modi while delivering his speech in Rajya Sabha. This new FDI, unfortunately, has many takers within Bharat. The Fraud foreign funding networks led by Missionaries and Islamic Fundamentalists are the convenient carriers. Since Independence, the ground created in academic institutions by the Communists has quickly turned into a battleground for intellectual warfare. New icons are created, and new issues are picked up to create social tensions. This battle is more difficult as we have to decolonise our own people with persistent efforts and conviction. Once we do that, the foreign hands will automatically have a little scope to apply their ‘toolkit’ in Bharat.
All these wars are being waged with foreign support. At the same time, they have rooted in the flawed intellectual understanding of our selfhood. We, as a civilisational nation, cannot be understood and explained within the Western Prism. Neither Liberal Capitalists nor Destructive Communists can ever decode the civilisational resilience of Bharat that has been surviving with its original ethos, despite the series of onslaughts for centuries. At the level of political consciousness, we have somehow regained the sense of ‘idea of Bharat’. The global assertion of Bharat is a reflection of the same. Now the time is apt to reclaim the same in the intellectual realm. For that, Swami Vivekananda’s advice of rewriting history has to be followed. Suppose our present and coming generations get the correct perspective about Bharat as a Rashtra. In that case, whether on the border or social media, all the wars can be countered with the civilisational might.
@PrafullaKetkar
