July 26, 2000

Redefining ‘composite culture’
Living together separately

The argument of ‘pseudo-secularism’ has been deployed by the Hindutva forces to sap the foundation of a multicultural state

The syncretistic and synthetic ethos of the Indian civilisation — popularly known as India’s ‘composite culture’ — is a pervasive notion as well as a real historical experience shared by many Indians and non-Indians, which have been carried in varied forms and meanings across time and space in the region. To them, the genius of India expresses itself in a unique way of accepting, assimilating and synthesising — rather than rejecting — diverse patterns of beliefs, thoughts and actual living of an infinite variety of people and cultures into an inclusive, variegated and complex tapestry of life and culture. This is what is traditionally epitomised as India’s ‘unity in diversity’, and perhaps more meaningfully described as ‘living together separately’. In the words of Humayun Kabir, one of the early and best exponents of India’s composite culture: ‘‘The story of India’s culture unravels the secret of that vitality and that wisdom. It is a story of unity and synthesis, of reconciliation and development, of a perfect fusion of old traditions and new values.’’

Professor Asim Roy, scholar at the University of Tasmania in Hobart (Australia), has delineated, in a note, how in the last couple of hundred years of the syncretistic tradition and perception have been challenged and undermined at times by various contesting ideologies. First, the ‘orientalist’ scholarship — almost exclusively based on Hindu, Buddhist and Islamic religious and other texts — constructed and helped to perpetuate exclusive and competing, if not conflicting, models of religious-cultural traditions in the region. Ignoring the intricate and fascinating processes of interaction of living religions and cultures in India, especially at the level of the masses, orientalism contributed to the construction of barriers among diverse cultural traditions. The second serious challenge came, at a somewhat later stage, from the Islamic ‘essentialists’ and the champions of Muslim separatism. The third, which emerged and almost ran parallel to that of the Muslim separatists, is represented by the proponents of Hindu nationalism. Subdued in the late colonial and early post-colonial decades, Hindu essentialism has gained political momentum and stakes in India.

The historiography of the ‘composite culture’ reveals its strong susceptibility and responsiveness to its changing political contexts. The clearest evidence lies in the fact that the bulk of its literature belongs to the last six or seven decades — a period in which the nascent Indian nationalism, liberalism and secularism found themselves seriously engaged and challenged, both intellectually and politically by religious nationalists anchored in either political Islam or political Hinduism or other religious faiths. The colonial context of the imperialists’ denigration and opposition to Indian nationalism, prior to the internal challenge and direct intervention on a serious scale, provided a congenial political climate for the persistence and growth of the ‘composite culture’ as reflected in the shared experiences of millions of Indians. Many nationalist leaders, writers and thinkers as well have contributed to rearing the edifice of this culture.

The political and cultural momentum of Muslim separatism reached its most critical stage in the 1940s. It is not surprising that the year before Indian Partition saw the publication, in 1946, of powerful expositions and defence of the composite culture by Jawaharlal Nehru, Rajendra Prasad, Asok Mehta and Achyut Patwardhan, and Humayun Kabir. After a brief lull in the wake of the stunning reality of the Partition, the debate was revived in the early 1960s as a part of the struggle against the communal uses of history from both the Hindu and Muslim viewpoints. Between 1957 and 1961, the Pakistan Historical Society came out with a four-volume edition entitled A History of the Freedom Movement. Around the same time the Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan began publishing volumes from a distinctly Hindu point of view. R.C. Majumdar, general editor of the series, echoed the Muslim separatists’ assertion that Hindus and Muslims could never come together. All this led to a renewed interest in finding the common grounds in history.

The concept of the ‘composite culture’, comments Prof Roy, has been politicised all around. The liberal and Marxist critique, he argues, has found it expedient to use it politically to combat communalism and other forms of sectarian strife, while the Muslim separatists and the champions of political Islam as well as their saffron-robed counterparts of ‘Hindutva’ or political Hinduism have targeted it to undermine this notion for their own political reasons. ‘‘The chauvinistic claim for a pan-Indian Hindu cultural monolith embodied in Hindutva,’’ he points out, ‘‘assumes much greater importance today in light of the political power vested in the Hindu-orientated political parties.’’ The argument of ‘pseudo-secularism’ has been deployed by them to sap the foundation of a multi-cultural state. They have appropriated the British divide-and-rule paradigm of Hindus and Muslims as separate civilisational entities that cannot survive together in peace. Also, doubts have already been expressed in these circles concerning the historical legitimacy of the syncretistic process in the making of India’s ‘composite culture’, with the corresponding claim made for a reconstructed and exclusive Hindutva.

The issue at stake is the role and impact of ‘dominance’ and ‘intervention’ in relation to culture and its reformulation. What we need to consider, says Prof Roy, are the following questions: Does the syncretistic culture have a basis in history? Or is it a convenient product of India’s nationalist aspiration? Imagined or real, does or can this tradition sustain our cultural continuum through the new millennium? What are the cultural as well as the political fallouts of the possible demise of the syncretistic values? How essential is it for the continuance of federal and democratic structure, and for India’s viability and survival? Never before has there been so much of urgency in re-examining the historical basis of this culture.

Prof Roy has sensitised me to three broad themes. First, the making and development of the ‘composite culture’, from ancient through medieval to modern and contemporary times, and the nature, form, content, meaning and symbolism of the syncretistic traditions at the elite, popular and regional levels. Second, we need to scrutinise the historical relationship between the syncretistic and other rival traditions in the pre-colonial, colonial and post-colonial stages and the role and the circumstances of intervention and its cultural and political implications. Finally, the critical relationship between India’s cultural formulation and its political future, with particular reference to democracy and federalism, must command our immediate attention.

 

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