India or Bharat? A historical and political perspective
By Prof Ramasamy Palanisamy
IS the ascension to power by Hindu nationalists embodied in the political party of the BJP the natural progression in the direction of the name change of India to Bharat?
Both the terms India and Bharat are in the Indian constitution, “India, that is Bharat, is the union of states”.
The probable name change that needs to be constitutionally adopted could be the natural concomitant of the various actions by the Hindu nationalist government to put an end to the last visible remnants of colonialism and imperialism.
Bharat, Hindustan and India were interchangeable terms used to describe the geographical land mass of the Indian subcontinent. However, the use of the term India could denote a limited territory. While India was the official name of the present-day geographical territory of India, the term is something that came to be accepted by the Persians and Europeans over the years.
Originally, it could have been associated with the Indus River. Essentially, it was a term imposed by others on the geographical territory.
On the contrary, terms such as Bharat and Hindustan hark back to thousands of years, terms that were coined internally as a result of the civilisational history of the present India.
Bharat might signify a territory or the role of a king, harking back to the Vedic ages, thousands of years ago.
The term Hindustan could have originated from the historical reference to the Sindhu river that flowed across the Indian subcontinent. However, the letter sounding ‘s’ in the course of history could have been rendered ‘h’.
Originally, Hindustan was meant to be a territory or land mass, it had nothing to do with the religion of Hinduism. Only much later did the word Hindu take on a religious character. Whatever the sources of the origins of these two terms, they were indigenous to the area. Their history is longer and more intrinsic to the development of the territory that came to be officially known as India.
Whether the name change is going to take place or not is yet to determined. But the invitation extended by the President of Bharat to the heads of state recently to attend the G20 Summit in New Delhi could be the first discernible shot in this direction.
The next parliamentary sitting scheduled soon might invariably touch on the question of name change. Whether India wants to stick to the externally imposed name or change to Bharat, the other constitutionally accepted term. Of course, the recently formed opposition national alliance has criticised the BJP government for changing the name of India to Bharat.
A congress party leader went to the extent of saying that the government should not abandon the brand name, that is, India. Some have raised the question of whether such a name change would affect India’s relationship with other nations.
The BJP has been taken to task for its engagement in nationalism and how the name change could affect the perceptions of religious minorities in the country. Since Bharat might be equated with the nationalism of the BJP, the majoritarian nationalism might affect the minorities adversely in terms of their rights.
Anyway, changing the name of a country is not something that is unique to India.
Turkey has changed its name to Türkiye to reflect the country’s rich civilisation history. Macedonia is called Northern Macedonia. Similarly, Holland has been termed The Netherlands. The possible name change from India to Bharat was preceded by past governments changing the names of places, streets and others from the old Mughal and colonial names to ones that were reflective of indigenous India.
The debate on the name change has just begun. Whether the government of India is preparing the ground for this eventual move remains to be seen. The G20 Summit might have provided the testing ground for such a historic move. – Sept 10, 2023
Prof Ramasamy Palanisamy is the former DAP state assemblyman for Perai. He is also the former deputy chief minister II of Penang.
Within India, in the Hindi language, the country has been referred to as Bharat for ages.
ReplyDeleteFact is, Post-1947 India being named "India" is a misnomer.
The ancient name of India is derived from reference to the Indus River. But the Indus River only flows through post-Independence India for a tiny part of its territory, the rest of its course being in Pakistan.